Dark Secrets
by Maya Perez
Summary: Novelization of 75% of Lazarus Rising ep 4.01 - added and expanded scenes. Contains info revealed through 4.11
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

_CLICK_

The sound thundered in Dean's head as he brought the manacle closed over the struggling wrist. It was but a small sound compared to the screaming, pleading, and misery being echoed by hundreds of voices all at once in the vast room, but it might as well have been the only one. This one was of his doing. This one spoke of the choice he'd made once more to put another on the rack to save himself from its pain. And it felt _good_.

Guilt and pleasure moved hand in hand inside him as the scent of primal fear perfumed the air. Things didn't work here as they did in the living world. Absence could be an ever greater bliss or horror than having something. For him, glory came with the absence of pain. An absence made ever more acute as he inflicted it on others as it had once been so mercilessly inflicted on him.

"What's the holdup…Dean?"

The rasping voice sent shivers up his Hell made flesh, dread and want pumping through his veins in the fake bodies they wore here, but he didn't cringe from it though he wanted nothing more than to run screaming in terror while at the same time fawn at the demon's feet. This was the being who'd made his soothing pleasure possible – Alastair. He was hate and love wrapped together as things could only manage to be in Hell. Yet it was best never to show any weakness or emotion, good or bad. They were the two things Alastair craved more than anything. And though he adored, despised him, it was never wise to give Alastair anything he wanted. He'd pry it open, twist it, and change you with it, forcing you to walk yet another step further from humanity and closer to becoming what he was.

"No hold up. Just letting him stew a bit." Absence at its worst. "You in a hurry?" Dean clamped his mouth shut, wondering if today would be the day he went too far. His mouth had always had a propensity for getting him in trouble, the more so the more he got pushed or frightened. The fact his soul was lost and rotting here didn't seem to have changed much as far as his lip was concerned. His eyes betrayed him though, flickering to the side to try to catch a glimpse of the demon's face -- his mentor, his keeper, his master.

He trembled as amused laughter gurgled into his ear. The demon was standing close behind him, so close Dean could feel the heat of his body despite that which already filled the ambient air. He almost screamed when the scaled claw patted him gently on the shoulder.

"Too true, my pupil." A forked tongue flicked his ear. "We have all the time we'll ever need here, you and I. Keep up the good work."

Dean nodded wishing the skin would rot off his shoulder where his teacher had touched it or that he could somehow enshrine it forever. Praise from that bastard made his insides clench and want to vomit, while also causing him to shiver in almost ecstatic bliss.

His first waking moments in Hell had found him suspended over an endless shaft of strung chains, surrounded by the stench of sulfur, his body pierced by hooks and stretched taught over endless emptiness. He'd dangled there for hours, days, the pain tearing at him, any vibration increasing the agony as the chains responded to the pull and sway of the air as thunder eternally rang around him. He was alone there, as if his were the only soul in the entirety of Hell. The continuous thunder and utter emptiness had nibbled at him, cutting him, worrying him, trying to drive him mad until he'd not been able to take it anymore and screamed out for help, for Sam, for anyone, just so there was a human voice, a sound to fill the endless, horrid space. He called out until his throat was raw and then some. And was rewarded with nothing but more ear splitting booms and painful reverberations.

Eventually though Alastair had come. Wide bat like wings had brought him effortlessly from nowhere, his grotesque body of scales, horns, and teeth as ugly as the glimpses he'd caught of demons hiding inside human bodies upstairs. The demon had grabbed one of the chains hooked into Dean's flesh and hung from it, exerting untold pressure on his already gouged and bleeding shoulder.

Dean had gritted his teeth and taken it, making sure no sound escaped his lips. There was no way he'd give the demon the satisfaction.

"You must be Dean Winchester."

His mouth came to the rescue as usual, even as his insides shrieked with fear. "And you're effing ugly, so what?"

It was the first time Dean heard that horrid sweet laugh. "Lilith said I might find you interesting. An idiot full of spunk." He gurgled with pleasure. "Guess she was right."

Terror jolted through him at the familiar name sending a shot of adrenaline through his already abused system. Lilith, the demon who'd held his contract, who'd sicked her hellhound on him, laughing as it tore him apart and killed him. Sammy had been left all alone with her -- with no one to help him. He had no idea if his brother was alive or dead.

"You and I are going to become _very_ good friends."

Then with a snap of his fingers the chains holding Dean up and disappeared. He fell, desperately trying to grab onto the other chains strung across the abyss as he zoomed past. He swished through the choking glowing green clouds until an eternity later he'd splattered onto the spiked ground below, his body totally broken yet somehow still alive.

Alastair had come for him himself and dragged his bleeding pieces to where he was now. He personally stripped him of all his former possessions and clamped Dean onto a blood soaked rack while explaining in horrid detail what he would do to him each time before doing it. How he would make him sing.

Dean had looked fondly back upon his time on the chains before the day was through.

And then, as he had every day after an endless battery of torture and detailed explanations, Alastair told him he had a choice. He could avoid the rack if he would just put another in his place. The flush of satisfaction as he spat in the demon's face and told him where he could stick it, almost made up for the pain still thrumming in his bones.

So it had gone for a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand times, until one day…he had broken. Or seen the darkness – depending on whom you asked. The humiliation of it still stung like acid yet also rang with pride. Now he was free of the rack and others were being made to take his place. He wasn't helpless, the one being made to suffer, but instead held power and free will, the will to instill suffering in others. And it ate him from the inside, a pain almost as fierce as being on the rack again, yet of his own choosing, not theirs, and therefore under his control. Even thinking about going back on the rack gave him the shakes and would paralyze even his runaway mouth – which made the lack of pain after all the sweeter. This was _living_!

Staring at the coarse ground beneath his bare feet, he reached for the ebony knife on the stand beside the rack, a light thrill traveling through his hand as he touched the cold, smooth stone. For not only did he willingly trade places with someone on the apparatus each day to escape it, he must also be the one to give them a taste of what they could expect beneath the hands of those more experienced than he. He must prove to his mentor he had paid attention during their long sessions when he had been the one strapped to the rack instead.

"_Please_! Please don't do this. Please! I'll do anything you want, give you anything you want. Please!"

Dean paid no heed to the panicked pleas even as guilt, shame, and rousing expectation suffused him from head to toe. He couldn't afford to show any of it however, and so did not. He kept his hand and the knife steady though he shook with both titillating horror and delight.

_I'm sorry, please scream, I'm sorry, please scream, I'm sorry, please scream, I'm sorry._

His spirit cried out in ecstasy as the knife touched flesh and made the first perfect incision into the skin. The faceless person before him shrieked, muscles tight, veins and tissue becoming extended, warm blood splashing on his knife and fingers then oozing slowly over the taught flesh to find its way to the obsidian floor. It was but the first step of his growing work, of making his own imprint on this flickering soul forever.

Dean had tried to commit suicide once, using the very knife he held now, but there was no way to die here. He was already dead. He'd only felt the pain of it and the rotting of the body as the cycle went round and then healed instantly when it came time to start a new day. It ended up only providing sport for everyone else, a distraction from the norm, and that was all. Even Alastair had been amused and laughed in his paralyzed dead face when he saw him then gave him commentary on how Dean could have made the death quicker, more painful, or last longer. He even encouraged him to try again.

Dean started in on a parallel cut to the first on the victim's inner thigh, the blood gushing over the pale skin. The screaming above him reached new heights sending bumps of pleasure over his flesh. Alastair called all their combined cries his symphony of pain – one which he was always striving to perfect. His afterlife's calling. Something Dean was proud, eager and sickened to help him try to achieve.

The clothes and items his mind had brought with him to the pit, to give him a sense of identity or self, had been stripped away and destroyed. For the rack you came as the day you were born – naked, exposed, vulnerable.

No longer on the rack, he wore blood for clothing, layers and layers of it draped over him as he went about his work, badges of honor, proof of his compliance, of his status. A thin loincloth in Alastair's maroon color showed he was no longer just meat but under apprenticeship. It made no sense to him, but it impacted the psyche anyway. Clothes meant civilization, control, nakedness the opposite or so they'd have one believe. And believe they did.

He'd been disgusted more than once by those who gave in with open arms and embraced this role before they were truly ready -- those who lavished pain on others without thought if not growing glee, the possible heights of their pleasure stunted by their eagerness. They gave away pieces of their soul too quickly and so were changing. He'd noticed bits of scales on some, extra growths of skin on others. It didn't take a genius to figure out how demons eventually came to look as ugly as they did. But why rush into it when you had all of eternity to enjoy the road of getting there?

Here he was in the minority. One of the few who'd come to this place through a demon deal -- knowing exactly what it meant and doing it willingly rather than being tricked into it or being one of those who'd forged a path here with how they lived their lives and got a free ticket in, knowingly or not. It made him special.

As long as he had been here, after all the _years_, he was sure he would have taken the short road, like some had, long ago if not for one thing – Sam – the one person who meant everything to him, the one bright thing in his life, the one person who was _not here_ and who he wanted to wait for. But who was also the one person who might never come. Sam was the kindest of them, the most pure – and what an utter delight it would be to get to corrupt and bring him to their way of thinking.

Dean forced himself to believe his brother was still alive, that he'd somehow survived being left alone with Lilith, that he was still up there, fighting the good fight, doing everything in his power to keep these sorry bastards from doing whatever they wanted. It was his one hope, his one shining beacon. Because when Sam fell, and fall he would, it would make it oh so much sweeter.

Though sometimes he despaired that in the end it would not be enough.

His father had been here a lot longer than him, and Dean had no idea how he'd kept his identity, his soul intact. Dean wasn't his father. He was weak. Had always been weak. Without him or Sam, he'd been rudderless, useless. If Heaven existed, he'd not been worthy to go there before, and he would definitely never be worthy to go there now. No pity would be visited on him, no mercy. He would remain here in this pit until the end of days. But if he couldn't escape it, maybe someday, he would rule it instead.

_Sammy, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I love you. Come let me show you what I've become. What you too could be someday._

His face broke into grimaced smile.

_Dean Winchester…_

He half turned around, not knowing where the odd disquieting voice had come from or who was calling him. His fake heart fluttered in his chest, though he could not say why. There had just been something so…

For no reason, he looked up. Though the vast room was always covered in gloom, the air grew brighter. Something about it screamed that it did not belong, that it was not from _here_. He didn't know how he knew, but he did and it made him glad as he trembled with fear. He didn't know what it was or why it was, but he was _glad_. Tears gathered in his eyes. It hurt to look at it was so bright.

Screams filled the room again yet not from those being tortured but from their demon masters instead. They were angry screams, frightened screams. And it filled Dean with awe and amazement that anything could do that to them in their own domain. He wanted more of it.

Black wings sprang upwards. The light seemed at first to back away, but then he realized it was actually gathering together, growing brighter and brighter like a small sun. It washed over him, over all of them, and made him feel strangely split in two, the mesh of his opposing feelings splitting apart, making him strangely alert as if up to now he had been drowning.

Suddenly a beam shot down and came straight at him. He didn't even have time to truly realize this before it hit him on the left shoulder. Blinding pain shot through him, but also calm, a balm of soothing peace.

Maybe he could die down here and find freedom after all.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Sam struggled to maintain his concentration, his arm extended before him to help him focus, pain piercing his head like a hot knife, stabbing him over and over and over again. Something warm and thick trickled down from his nose, but he barely registered it. Instead, he continued to exert his will over the demon inhabiting the body of sixty year old Martha Dexter, willing it to come out. Black spots crowded before his eyes as his pain spiked, yet the dark smoke, the corporeal form of the demon, oozed as he wanted out of the woman's mouth to pool about the edges of the pentagram she was being kept in. With a wrench he willed the smoke to be gone.

It thrashed like a snake on the floor then flared red from the inside before burning to ashes and disappearing. Another demon gone.

Sam gasped as he released his hold on the power he had siphoned through him and fell to one knee. The hot knife was gone but his head still pounded as if a thunderstorm were raging inside it. He felt like his cranium might explode at any minute and splatter his brains all over the room. A moan escaped him before he could reel it in.

"You all right?" Ruby was suddenly at his side, half holding him up.

He tried to focus his eyes but they wouldn't cooperate. He wiped away at the blood on his upper lip only managing to smear it around rather than clear it away. "The woman?"

"Didn't make it. Sorry."

He felt his heart lurch. So far, when he could get this to work, he'd only been able to save a little over twenty-five percent of those possessed. Too many of them had been under the influence for too long or been ridden too hard. Still, one fourth was more than he could ever have saved using the knife. But he needed to do better. Must do better.

"This one…was tougher…"

Ruby helped him up to his feet. He swayed for a moment, but thought he would make it. She let him go.

"Yeah, well, we're not all created equal. Even more of a reason to get stronger, Sam."

He nodded and instantly regretted it, setting off the headache to a higher raging pitch than before. He stumbled. Though he towered over her, Ruby bravely wedged herself under his arm and kept him upright. If not for her demon strength he was sure the two of them would have ended up tumbling to the floor.

"It will get easier." Her voice was unusually gentle. "I promise."

"If it doesn't…kill me first…" He touched his brow as if his hand could somehow help hold his insides in. He could have sworn the pounding was getting worse instead of better. It was more painful than the visions used to be and those were no picnic. Made it so hard to concentrate.

"I'll get rid of the body, you just rest and I'll come back for you." She leaned him up against the inside wall of the long storage shed where they had laid the trap for this particular demon. Before he realized what she was going to do, she swept her lips over his then ran her tongue over his blood smeared skin, licking it away. He was too stunned to do anything but stare, even as another part of him twitched in response.

"I can taste the power in it. _Your_ power. You can do this, Sam." She pulled away from him and moved toward the body on the floor. She grabbed a hand that had fallen outside the circle and dragged the body out of the devil's trap drawn on the floor.

Sam gingerly slid down to sit on the concrete, every little movement setting the thunder in his head to greater levels of excitement. Until he got the headache under control he'd be pretty much useless. It'd been the one major drawback so far of using his powers but Ruby insisted that would grow to be less of a problem the more he used it.

She came back long enough to put down a lukewarm Coke next to him then stood up. "I'll be back in a jiff." Ruby picked up the woman's body as if it weighed nothing and headed for the door.

Sam used the end of his shirt to wipe at his face wondering if what she said was true. Could she really taste his taint? Heckles rose on the back of his neck at the thought. He was a freak, pure and simple, but it didn't mean he had to like it.

Trying not to think about it, he dug out the bottle of aspirin he'd taken to carrying everywhere with him and dumped out four tablets. He quickly swallowed the pills and begged them to hurry. Resting his arms on his knees, he let his head hang between them trying to move as little as possible.

Yet he knew his pain was probably nothing compared to what his brother was being made to suffer through. He'd asked Ruby once what she thought would be done to Dean in Hell and she refused to tell him anything, other than it would be unpleasant. As unreserved as she normally was, her lack of an answer had hit him hard. He was as capable as anyone of reading between the lines.

His discomfort would never compare to his brother's anguish – anguish he suffered on Sam's behalf. The weight of Dean's amulet dragged at his neck – his companion, his reminder of better times, the herald of his unfulfilled and broken promises.

Yes, Dean wouldn't be happy about what he was doing, and yes, Sam had promised him he wouldn't use his powers, but there really just wasn't any choice. He couldn't survive out here doing this on his own. Not for long. Lilith still wanted him gone and by any means necessary. Ruby had bragged more than once about the bounty on his head in the demon world and that it was growing. He had no choice but to try to get them before they got him. No choice but to try to fix what he had done when he'd ignored the Devil's Gate for the sake of his revenge on Jake.

But most of all, he had to stop Lilith. Whatever her plans were, they couldn't be allowed to happen. She must be destroyed. And she would pay, and pay dearly for what she'd done to his brother. He would make her regret it if it was the last thing he ever did.

Sam grabbed onto the glowing ball of hatred buried deep inside him and let it buoy him while he waited for his massive, self induced headache to subside.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Dean slammed hard onto the floor.

He popped his eyes open, his mouth gasping in a manic breath. There'd been pain, he remembered pain, and peace, and then a strange lifting sensation before being shoved hard wherever he was.

He coughed; his throat dry, the air strange.

It wasn't the pit, he knew that instantly; his senses inundated with the smell of dirt and wood and old rot. He couldn't see a thing, the place pitch black. But he could feel. And what he felt at the moment were familiar things. His hips and legs hugged by denim. Feet nestled in socks and boots. The soft touch of cotton on his chest and arms. The well-known weight of his wrist watch and skull bracelet – even his silver ring. He was back!

But back where? He was laid out horizontally, on something hard, and the air felt way too stale.

His hands moved quickly to his pockets. He searched inside them and found his lucky lighter. Bringing it out, he flicked it on, his heart, his _real_ heart, pounding like mad in his chest. He had to swallow a sudden bought of claustrophobia, his gaze flickering madly around him in panic as the light revealed where he was. He was inside a wooden box, most likely a coffin – _his_ coffin.

"Help!" The sound was barely more than a strangled croak. He coughed, his throat not liking being used, then half choked. He gasped for more air, not sure if it was his growing panic at where he was or that there really wasn't enough of it in there. "Help."

Another gasp, his body fighting him, as if it didn't know him. "Help." At this rate no one would hear him. No one _could_ hear him, even if his voice cooperated. He was buried underground. He was on his own.

Dean touched one of the boards barely inches above him then another. He smacked one with the back of his hand. It shifted and dirt dribbled down from the seam and fell onto his face, into his eyes, stinging. The scent of earth grew heavy.

Only he'd be so lucky as to somehow be brought back from the pit only to die in his grave. Where the hell was Sam?

His lungs and brain screamed for air, telling him that the lighter would consume what little there was if he left it on, but he couldn't bring himself to go back into the darkness. He pried at the loosened board with his fingers, the wood biting into his flesh, as he struggled to make it break. He groaned, fighting for leverage, and put his all into the effort, it being no exaggeration that success or failure would make the difference between life and death this day.

The board snapped and suddenly he was flooded with falling dirt, which took his breath and the light with it. He choked back a scream as the earth piled on top of him, clamping down on his fevered imagination as the pitch darkness and unexpected weight allowed all sorts of scenarios to play unwanted in the background of his mind.

Reaching up again, Dean found another board and pulled on it as well. More earth fell on his face, arms, everywhere. He closed his eyes and mouth, already feeling smothered and half strangled. He shoved his hands forward into the bigger opening above him and pulled clumps of earth down on top of himself, his insides screeching this was madness that he would bury himself by doing this, while another part, the one desperate to live, to survive, said he must go up, up if he wanted even a slight chance of getting out of there alive.

Dean clawed his way upwards, sitting up inside the coffin, shoving and pulling. The dirt continued to rain around him, trying to weigh him down, wrapping around him like a lover gone mad, wanting to hold him, keep him with it forever. He kept on reaching and scraping, leaving his head bent to keep the earth from going up his nostrils, panting to get air into his burning lungs as it grew harder and harder to breathe.

His scraped, sore fingers touched on some kind of weave which resisted him. He shoved and shoved at it, getting his legs beneath him to try to push from beneath. First one finger then two broke through and his hand almost immediately followed as something cool caressed his skin. The outside!

He shifted his legs, his second hand rising through the dirt, his lungs starting to burn. He pushed against the resistance above him, needing to be free, demanding to be allowed to live. His ears rang as he ran out of air, a different kind of darkness nipping at his consciousness.

With both hands outside he shoved them to either side to broaden the hole. Pushing with his legs, grabbing onto whatever he could with his hands, his head finally came out and he gasped for sweet air almost passing out as it rushed inside him to fill his blood with oxygen again.

Pausing only for a moment, not yet quite free, he pushed again with his legs, fighting the ground still trying to keep him. Grunting, screaming as he used all he had to get out, his aching, abused hands grabbed at the grass, the weight of the dirt that sifted down trying its damndest to pin him and pull him back within its bosom.

Dragging, pushing, pulling, straining until his entire body was free, Dean stopped, hurting and exhausted. Hands, arms, his whole body ached. He rolled over onto his back, still trying to pull air into his battered lungs, eyes closed as he swallowed in gulps, trying to ease his scratched throat. Somehow, somehow he'd actually made it.

His eyes slid open and he stared up at the sky, its clear blue color something he'd thought he'd never see again. The sun's rays falling on his face and exposed skin felt glorious. Hurting had never felt so good. It meant he was _alive_.

Grunting with effort, Dean shambled to his feet. This was obviously his grave, marked out by a simple wooden cross. Yet no Sam, no Bobby. And suddenly that didn't matter as he got a look at what else was around him. He stared at it not truly understanding what he was seeing. It raised the heckles on the back of his neck and sent goose bumps scurrying all over his body as he turned in a full circle. Even standing in front of it, in the midst of it, it numbed his brain as it tried to process what he saw.

His grave was in the middle of a forest. Or it had been. For as he turned where he stood, in a small glade of wild grass, he saw tree after tree toppled away all around him as if his body's resting place had been the center of a nuclear blast.

And he had absolutely no idea who or what could have done something like that.

It felt real, it all looked real, but he still found himself doubting, sure that somehow in some way this was a trick set up by Alastair. That at any moment the sky would darken, and the endless horizon would shrink into an obsidian cave, the light fading away to perpetual gloom. Yet the seconds continued to tick on and nothing happened. The sun still shone, a lone cloud skirting past in a wide blue sky, the wind whispering past him, the smell of dirt, grass, and trees all around him.

This was _real_.

He was out. He was _alive_! Sam had done it, someway somehow, his little brother had done it and he was out of the pit! His knees felt weak as he started accepting the realization. He was _free_. FREE! He spread his arms wide, his face turned up toward the sun and just reveled in the knowledge for a moment.

The smile pulling at his face as he wallowed in the sensation then fractured and died. This wasn't right. He didn't deserve it. Not after the things he'd felt and done.

The things he'd _felt_ and _done_.

The last ten years of his unlife flashed past him in an instant.

Dean's legs gave out and he fell to his knees in the grass, his arms hanging limp at his sides, as he stared unseeing at the sky as warm tears rolled unbidden down his face.

He had broken. He'd let others take his place to save himself and then he'd tortured them and _enjoyed_ it. He'd embraced the madness that would be his for the rest of eternity and yet here he was -- alive again, on earth, where _he did not belong_. All those faceless souls, countless and countless of them and he hadn't cared, he had not cared! He would gleefully still be inflicting horrendous atrocities on others, trying so hard to please those above him, knowing the only payback he would ever get would be on those weaker than him. And he would have been _satisfied_!

But instead…he was free…

Free to be sane again, free to remember what he'd done, free to realize the horror he had visited on others…

Free to know that if he was ever taken back, he would most likely do the same all over again.

And he would have to live with that.

His tortured scream was the only sound to break the silence.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Sam glanced up at the neon clock by the double bed in the corner to check on the time – it was close to three. He picked up the bottle of Break-Free and squirted some of it on the nylon toothbrush he was using to clean his Taurus PT99. The cracked Formica of what passed for a table at the no-tell motel him and Ruby had holed up in the last couple of days looked like it'd been used for a lot worse things.

Ruby had been gone for the last several hours trying to get some intel from her underground sources. The two of them had picked up the trail on some demons and had tracked them to Tennessee and were trying to narrow in on them. Sam had been more than happy to let her go get what she could on her own. He still wasn't entirely comfortable with spending the kind of time with her he'd spent with Dean, especially when he didn't truly understand their current 'relationship'.

Not that relationship was probably the correct word for what was going on between them.

Sam picked up the bore brush to work on the barrel.

During the year he'd so desperately been trying to find a way to get Dean out of his deal, Ruby had tracked them down over and over and helped them. When they first met, she'd saved his life when he'd been at the mercy of the demon Pride. He'd then helped her out in turn, though she'd not been exactly willing to admit it. Then she'd disappeared like she'd never been.

The fact the Colt existed and it could kill demons was amazing enough, but that there was a knife out there that could do the same thing had been mind boggling. Him and Dean, even Bobby, had never heard of the like before.

Then Ruby had shown herself to him again and filled him with questions, questions about his mother, her relatives, things that at the time he wasn't sure he should even pursue with the clock ticking on Dean's deal.

But he'd looked into it. Found out that all those his mother had known or were related to had died off one by one and sometimes under extremely mysterious circumstances. Almost like someone was trying to erase any trace of her, and subsequently her sons as well. But why? Sam was the last of the Yellow Eyed Demon's tainted children, sure, but YED was dead. His plans had been destroyed with him, or so they'd believed. Ruby didn't think so and wanted to make sure.

He pulled the bore brush out and then took a rag soaked in Break-Free and pushed it through the barrel.

She was cocky, sure of herself, never liked to show she wasn't in total control. Qualities, weirdly enough, she shared with his brother. It had made finding out she was a demon all the more shocking. Yet she'd promised she was working against her own kind. That she was there to help. He'd never been so naïve, no matter how many times Dean accused him of it, of believing there wasn't something in it for her in all this. He thought that even now. Despite the fact that time after time she'd saved them, showed up when it counted, and kept them from being found by Lilith and her goons.

Not all of her suggestions had they been able to swallow, a lot of them he felt were the reason Dean disliked her so much. And there had been times when his soul had cried at what she said needed to be done, but if they hadn't found another way around the problem, he would have done them, like allowing the virgin and Ruby to sacrifice themselves to get rid of the demons who had hemmed them in at the sheriff's station in Colorado.

Once, a few years ago, Dean told him how it frightened him as to the lengths he would be willing to go for his family. Sam hadn't understood it then, but he did now. The last year had taught him exactly what lengths he'd be willing to go for Dean. He'd have done anything, no matter how it would taint his soul, if it meant they would live, give him time to save Dean, get Ruby to help him. Even if in the end, she really didn't have the means to save his brother after all.

She'd admitted as much to Dean. Though with Sam the version had differed slightly. She admitted to him that she'd basically told him what he wanted to hear because then he would think about using his powers, about letting her show him how to do it, and thus hedging that they would make him strong enough to keep Lilith from taking Dean when the time came due, making what she'd said the truth. But Sam hadn't done it. He hadn't capitulated, not sure it was right, not wanting to feel more like a freak, not wanting Dean to stare at him like he might not be his brother anymore. And it had cost Dean his soul.

The soaked rag came out and a dry one went in.

Despite Lilith's victory with regards to Dean, Sam had survived against her, through no real effort of his own. Ruby was sent far away when her meat suit got hijacked, and still she had conned her way back to this plane, found him, and instead of killing him, saved him yet _again_.

He shook his head, set the rags to the side and started loading the gun's clip with 9mm rounds.

The moment she admitted to him she could do nothing to help Dean now that he was dead Sam had given her the brush off. When she'd insisted, he'd pushed. Smacking her with the one thing he had put up with before despite the fact he known it'd been wrong, despite the fact it had made him a hypocrite, only because he hadn't been able to let go of the belief that if all else failed she could save his brother – and that was the fact that for her to be there, to be able to help them, she had to steal someone else's body, disrupting if not destroying another's life.

Even that hadn't stopped her. Instead she'd left him and found herself the body of someone who didn't actually need it anymore – taking possession of a meat suit the moment it was marked as clinically dead. She'd even brought him the paperwork to prove it.

But she hadn't stopped there. No, not at all. First she gave him something he'd needed desperately, a means of possibly surviving now that the Colt was gone. He'd still had the knife, but using it meant being up close and personal, not always the easiest course when dealing with demons, as their telekinetic powers and greater than human strength majorly messed up the odds. What Ruby gave him was a rope, one he could cling to, and one he was finally desperate enough and ready to grab – she'd help train him, show him how to use his latent demonic powers – the ones given to him by YED's blood infusion when he was barely six months old, the powers he'd wished to instill in the future leader of his demonic army.

And then, though he still wouldn't be able to get his brother back, he could at least get revenge. Or die trying.

He slapped the filled clip into the Taurus and chambered a round.

That was when Ruby truly saved him. He still wasn't sure whether he was aware of what he was doing back then and didn't care or if it was all a subconscious impulse, but for the second time that year he'd tried to go after Lilith not fully prepared. Ruby had tried to stop him, to drive some kind of sanity back into him, but he'd rushed headlong anyway. And despite the fact she could have very well been killed along with him, she'd come to his rescue, tried to delay the demon assassins on his behalf, telling him to get out of there. If he'd listened to her, she would have been killed or dragged back to Hell, but he'd come back and done for her what she had done for him.

But before that, even before he came to realize how to live again, she'd already set him on the path that would take him there. That's when _everything_ truly changed. When Ruby showed him he wasn't alone, that there was someone with him who understood, who cared, who was as desperate as he was to make a difference. And who, like him, was looking for, needing, somewhere and someone to whom to belong…

That day they'd gone from teacher and student, from tainted human and demon, to lovers… To Sam Winchester having sex with a corpse animated by a demon with a conscience. It sent even his level of freak to new never imagined heights. And he still wasn't entirely sure how to deal with it, despite all he owed her.

The door to the motel room banged open. Sam jumped to his feet bringing up the Taurus and aimed it in that direction, adrenalin surging through his veins.

Ruby stormed in then slammed the door shut. She didn't even look in his direction before she started opening drawers and grabbing out their things to throw on the bed. "Sam, we need to get a move on."

He set the safety back on the gun and laid it back on the table, retaking his seat. From the way she was just randomly stuffing their gear into duffels, he had a pretty good idea she'd stumbled onto something outside of what they were here for, maybe even something big. His pulse sped up, hoping it was something on Lilith. He didn't let it show though, just in case it wasn't.

"Something happen?"

He calmly put the gun cleaning materials back into the kit then took the PT99 and slipped it into the small of his back. Ruby was currently in charge of the demon killing knife. He had a small silver dagger in his boot and another in his shirt pocket, which wouldn't be good enough for taking care of a demon, but would do for just about anything else. Though he'd always teased Dean about going overboard all the time where being armed was concerned, he'd started taking at least the general lesson to heart and didn't go anywhere unarmed, not even to the bathroom. Though he was the hunter, he was still being hunted.

"Something's going on up in Illinois. Something that just made our targets jump ship and start up that way in a hurry." She never slowed down from shoving stuff into the bags. "Figure we should follow after them and maybe we can find out what's going on and take advantage of it."

Sam frowned. Illinois…he hadn't been back there since…

"Rumor has it this is something Lilith desperately wants to know about." She flashed him a wicked grin. "I figured you'd like it better if she didn't."

He rose to his feet. "And where would we be going, exactly?"

Ruby zipped up a duffel and tossed it toward the door as if it weighed no more than a piece of paper. Though it was a side benefit of being what she was, it still caught him unawares sometimes. "Whatever it was, seems it happened not far from the city of Pontiac."

His breath caught in his throat. Pontiac was but a stone throws away from the Humiston Woods. But no, no way this was related. Dean had been dead for four months. And no way they knew where he and Bobby had buried him. If they did they would have done something long before this point.

He threw a guarded glance in Ruby's direction. He'd never told her where they had interred Dean and she'd never asked. And no way Bobby would have told anyone, even with the ugly way Sam had left and cut him off from his life. This had to be some kind of coincidence, but it still made him uneasy.

"And you have no idea at all what this is about?"

Ruby glanced over at him and gave him half snort. "I'm a witch, Sam, not some fortune teller. And it's not like I could just call up Lilith and ask."

He felt a dual tingle of anticipation and dread. Ruby only got snarky when she was excited or frightened. At the moment, he had a feeling she was a little of both. However vague, whatever she had found out was more than the usual.

That suited him fine. If demons were there, they'd take care of them. He would save the people he could and those he couldn't would at least be free from being used. And if whatever was going on made Lilith herself show up, he'd make sure she would regret it.

Sam headed toward the bathroom to help Ruby pack.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Dean didn't know how long it was before he could make himself move, before he could stand up on his feet without falling down and was able stumble away from his own grave.

Every breath, every beat of his heart drove in again and again that he was alive. This was his fourth life, three more than should ever have been his in the first place. Three more than he would ever deserve. But how had he gotten here?

Worse, what had his brother done to make it happen? It shouldn't have been possible. It wasn't _right_. A Winchester would not trade his life for his again!

He needed to find Sam. Needed to find out what was going on. Only then might he dare believe there could be a day he would be all right about being here, though he had a feeling it wouldn't ever come to that at all.

As he stumbled through the woods, heading south, something about the place seemed familiar, but with the eerie quiet covering the devastated forest at the moment, it was hard to place. He was sweating in minutes, the sun hot, though nothing like the heat he'd experienced recently elsewhere. He took off his outer shirt and tied it in a knot at his waist, hoping he didn't look too much like a preppy reject. Yet despite everything, he reveled at the sweat accumulating at his brow, drenching the pit of his arms, rolling down his back, every sensation, good or bad, proclaiming that he was alive again.

As he ran across a well traveled trail, the normal sounds of the forest finally started coming back. The farther he travelled from his grave, the more the world seemed to welcome him, serenading him with bird song, insect buzzing, the sound of rustling leaves.

The weird sense of familiarity grew making him sure he'd been here before. He would have expected Sam just to bury him somewhere in Indiana and have done with it, but maybe he hadn't. This place had the look and feel of their summer place, the private Winchester resort and training ground. Only Sammy would be so nostalgic.

The thought of his brother reigned bitter sweet. No use being back if he didn't know what had happened to his sibling, if he didn't know what price he'd be made to pay for bringing his worthless brother back. He doubted Sam would have even bothered to try if he had an inkling of what Dean had been up to of late. His stomach growled insisting there were more pressing things to worry about than the state of his soul. His burning throat doubled that assessment. His abused throbbing hands chimed in just because they could.

The trail finally crossed a blacktop road and he followed that instead. The morning had progressed and the sun sat higher in the sky, beating mercilessly down on him. Guess it wanted to make sure he knew exactly where the heat came from on this plane.

The air shimmered before him, creating small pools of illusionary water, reminding him even more of how desperately thirsty he was. Yet he'd not seen any cars, or people, not even some over eager campers. It was like he was alone in the world. Like it had been recreated like him, anew.

Man, he sure was getting maudlin in his new age. Wouldn't Sammy have had a good laugh at that.

The blacktop finally crossed another road. But even better, Dean spotted a gas station not far beyond it. He wiped at his sweating forehead, smearing the dirt already caked there, which made the scent of earth waft over him again. That was one smell he didn't think he'd miss for a while and was quite frankly ready to stop smelling any time now.

The station looked like a one bay garage set up, green trim with off-white, grimy walls, two old style red pumps in front. It had that good old boy feel to it. And a more welcomed sight he would have been hard to come by. Gas stations meant water, food, information -- people.

He noticed two old clunkers in the lot, but they didn't look like they'd moved in a while. A lone public phone booth sat off to the left. Filing the info away, he homed in on the gas station itself. Walking up to the front door, he peeked through the window when he turned the knob and found it locked. He didn't see anyone. The closed sign was up and there were no posted times.

"Hello?" His voice came out like it'd been swept across sandpaper, his throat still not appreciating the fact he was trying to use it and making sure he knew it. Getting no answer, and still seeing no signs of life inside, he untied his long sleeved shirt from his waist and wrapped it tight around his right hand. A hard smack with his fist at the bottom window pane broke the glass. Smashing enough of it to make room for his arm, he reached inside and let himself in.

Barely giving his eyes time to note the white and green tiled floor, the half counter just inside, and the short aisles of goods in the store, his attention was trapped by the coolers in back and the drinks nestled inside them. Rushing to it, he shoved the glass door to the side and reached in for a bottle of water.

Twisting the top off, Dean chugged down the cold liquid, feeling like it'd been years since he'd been able to do anything about his thirst. The water pulsed down his throat, coating, soothing, like the Nile bringing life back to the desert during the flood season. He could feel it traveling down his mouth, his throat, into his stomach, rejuvenating every inch of him as it went along.

With half the bottle gone, he was forced to let it go and come up for air, his greedy lungs still gasping for the stuff as if trying to make up for the air he'd not been breathing all this time.

He was alive!

Dean glanced around him, still feeling the miracle was too good to be true, sure at any moment the other shoe would drop, and half wanting it to. Yet all he saw around him was the normal, the mundane – red gallon gasoline plastic containers for sale, small isles of goodies for travelers, the green counter, an out of date calendar, cigarettes for sale, oil, candy, the smell of plastic, stale donuts, old coffee, just like a million other mom and pop gas stations he'd been to over the years.

That's when he spotted the newspaper rack and he homed in on it only a little less eagerly than the water. He'd got it right. He was in Illinois. The date on the paper was September the eighteenth, two thousand and eight. He had to read it three times. Heckles rose once more on the back of his neck. There was a moment of disorientation as time between here and the other place clashed together in his brain trying to make sense. "September…"

He'd only been gone four months in the real world, despite the eternity it had felt like down there. All he'd gone through and all he'd done and it'd been only a measly four months up here. Even as his mind ogled over it, a part of him was elated. It meant Sam was probably still around, that he hadn't had to do without his big bro for too long. He'd not realized until that moment that a part of him had been terrified at the thought that years had gone past earth side as they had downstairs. And the chances that his brother was still breathing after forty years were slim.

Setting the paper back down, he caught a glimpse of an old sink out of the corner of his eye. Though somewhat grimy, but knowing he was in much worse shape than it was, he moved toward it and set his long sleeved shirt to the right and then turned on the sink's left spigot. He would have much preferred a shower, long and hot with lots of steam, but beggars couldn't be choosers. He cupped his hands beneath the clear stream and splashed water on his face. It felt cold and awesome, and best of all real. He did it again hoping most of the dirt was dripping off with it.

Shutting the water off, he used the green shirt to dry his face. Then he spotted his reflection in the mirror above the sink. Same face, same bod, same everything. He'd been returned to his own carcass not someone else's. But how? He was sure his body hadn't been in any shape to service anyone ever again. The hellhound had torn him a new one. Two or three, even. Yet from what little he could see and feel, he was hale and whole.

Trepidation bubbling through him, Dean lifted his shirt only to see perfect unblemished skin beneath. His tattoo for protecting him from possession was even there. This wasn't possible. His mind flashed back for a moment to the tearing claws, the chomping teeth, his skin turned into ribbons as blood welled all over him as he died in agonizing pain.

But in the image staring back at him there was no evidence of any of that. There were no scars, no surgical stitches, no nothing. It was as if nothing ever happened.

Dean let go of his shirt, not sure how such a thing could be possible. He'd never heard of anyone ever been freed from Hell, let alone get put back together into a perfectly healthy body when the original had been torn to shreds and been rotting in the ground for months.

That's when he felt it, a slight throb on his upper shoulder as he moved. With a frown he half turned to have it face the mirror and then pulled up the black t-shirt's short sleeve. He hissed in surprised as the cloth raked over the skin and it slapped him with pain, his eyes widening as he spotted puffed up red skin, like from a burn. But as he stared at it, he realized it was even weirder than that. There was a friggin' hand print on his arm, as if something hot had touched him and blistered his skin. Like someone grabbed onto him and yanked him from the pit. The burn was on the same side as where that beam of light had hit him. But what the hell did it mean?

He quickly pulled his sleeve back down and put on the long sleeved shirt back on to boot, knowing he wasn't about to get any answers at the moment, and not entirely sure he was ready for them anyway. As he rolled up his sleeves, his stomach decided to make its complaints known again and rumbled from his insides.

Deciding to ditch his questions for the moment and stick to things he could actually do something about, Dean raided the aisles. An almond chocolate bar was swiped, half peeled and shoved in his mouth in less than two seconds before he grabbed two or three more and shoved them into a plastic bag he pilfered from behind the counter. Then it was just a matter of walking up and down the lanes grabbing whatever took his fancy. Been a long time after all – he had some catching up to do.

The cooler came next as he went past and three bottles of water went into the bag. He turned, looking for whatever else he might want. It wasn't like any of this would take him down any deeper into the shithole of trouble he was already in. With avid gusto, he bit into the bar in his mouth and chomped down. Chocolaty goodness…damn!

Dean rounded the aisle and spotted a magazine rack. He was about to dismiss it from his mind when he saw it – what no American boy should do without – Busty Asian Beauties. And damn if this issue didn't look like a beaut – the cover model alone…that long black hair, those luscious red lips, with a rack the size of Dallas and looking both naughty and untouchable in a red hot clingy dress. All his dreams come true in a portable package and no strings attached.

He felt a grin tug at his face as he picked the magazine up, unable to help himself. Damn it was good to be back! And time to give his new, resurrected eyes something pleasant to look at. He flipped through the pages, liked what he saw, and decided it just had to come with. He tucked the magazine away thinking about popping the rest of the chocolate bar in his mouth and maybe pretending it was this Asian beauty's tongue.

Still, he wouldn't get far without cash. He glanced over toward the old cash register on the counter across the way. Hustling over there, he studied the machine and hit the No Sale key. The cash register opened for him with a ding. He snapped his fingers in victory, that old Winchester touch still working, reconstituted body or not.

The smell and feel of the money and the old sweat of those who'd handled it before, the jingle of the coins as he scooped them up and dumped them in his pocket – all of it reminded him again and again that he was _back_.

Out of nowhere, the medium sized TV to his left came on. He stared at the snow on the screen then reached forward to turn it off. No sooner had he done it when the radio on the other end of the counter turned on with a twangy static filled tune. Creepy.

The TV turned on again.

Goosebumps rose up his arms and back. A weird thrumming filled the air and he could feel it penetrate all the way to his bones. This couldn't be good. Something was coming. He just had no idea what. Looked like the other shoe was finally dropping.

No way was he going back without a fight.

Dean hurried down one of the isles sure he'd seen what he needed before and found it – blue containers full of salt.

He struggled to get the lid off of one and then poured some of the contents on the sill of the nearest window. A high keening started in above the thrumming and rose to a piercing shriek that punched through his ears and straight to his brain. He scrunched down in pain, uselessly bringing his free hand to cover his ear as the shrieking intensified. He tried to keep salting the window sill but the shrill escalated yet again and he buckled in rising agony dropping the salt container to try to cover both ears.

The window chose that moment to implode.

Bits flew everywhere showering him in glass. A second window blew, though he more felt it than heard it, as he tried to duck back toward the counter area. He fell to the ground, still struggling to cover his ears. More glass rained over him, tickles of hurt as they tried to drive into his flesh.

Dean forced himself to get away from the rest of the windows and toward the front door, but more glass exploded with even higher force. The resulting concussion smacked him back against the green counter.

Then it all just stopped.

Dean reeled from being thrown around, his ears ringing like mad. Trying to catch his breath, straining to look everywhere at once, he still couldn't find a source for this madness. He pulled himself up off the floor by grabbing onto the counter. Was it Alastair? Was he trying to find him, to drag him back? He glanced outside, still looking for he knew not what, and saw nothing abnormal. Every window in the place had blown inwards but otherwise everything was calm and normal again.

It was time to get moving. Time to get help.

Stumbling around, crunching glass underfoot, Dean found his goody bag then made his way outside. Spotting the phone booth again, he headed toward it. Slapping the glass accordion door open, he slipped inside and using some of the change he just stole, pumped it into the coin slot then punched in Sam's cell phone.

What came from the other side was as shocking as it was unexpected -- three horrid rising tones and then a cold voice. "We're sorry. You have reached a number that has been disconnected." WTF?

Dean slammed the hook to get a new connection, grabbed at the change dumped into the return slot and popped it back in. He quickly punched in Bobby's number. If anyone would know what was going on, it would be Bobby.

The phone rang once before being answered. "Yeah?"

Dean felt a flush of relief at hearing the familiar voice. "Bobby?"

"Yeah."

He wanted to smile at the ingrained cautious tone, but there just wasn't time for it. "It's me."

"Who's me?"

Bobby didn't recognize him? It'd only been a few months. Forty years for him and he still recognized the old hunter's baritone. "Dean."

The line went dead in his ear.

Dean pulled the phone away from him and stared at it again wondering what the hell was going on. It'd only been four months, people! This was not the reception he'd been anticipating at all.

He hit the phone hook again and pumped in some more coins before dialing Bobby again.

"Who is this?" His friend wasn't sounding too pleased. It didn't make any sense.

"Bobby, listen to me."

"This ain't funny. Call me again and I'll kill ya."

The line went dead again.

Dean glared at the phone none of this making one lick of sense. Because if Sam had brought him back, Bobby would know about it, right? And he'd want to talk to Dean, wouldn't he? He put the phone back on the hook.

What the heck was he supposed to do now?

Turning around in the booth, his gaze landed again on one of the old cars in the lot. It was dust covered and looked to be a zillion years old, a fifties model of some sort, and one only ever driven by a door to door salesman or some old grandpa. He sighed in disappointment. But he reminded himself again that beggars couldn't be choosers. He'd have to work with what he had.

Tromping on over to it, he glanced at the interior and noticed it was green like the inside and outside of the station. Guess they believed in matching color schemes around here. Door wasn't locked, but then again why would it be? Who in their right mind would want to steal this antique and out here in the middle of the boonies to boot?

Slipping inside, he pulled out several wires from beneath the steering column and using his pocket knife cut and stripped a couple of them. Hoping for some more of that mechanical Winchester magic, he scrapped the two exposed wires together, trying to get the motor started. "Come on, come on."

After a couple of tries, he heard the engine catch. One hurtle down. He checked the gas gage and found it full. Good. Setting his bag on the seat next to him, he put the car in drive and got out of there. Time to go find some answers, whether certain people liked it or not.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

"Take the next right."

Sam threw a quick glance in Ruby's direction before doing as directed. They'd driven the whole day through with only a couple of short breaks for them to stretch their legs. Despite some illegal speeds, it was still close to eleven at night by the time they made it into Pontiac.

Saddled with the responsibility of driving Baby (not even he was insane enough to let Ruby touch her steering wheel – dead or not, Dean would have never stood for it – and while there might be some promises to his brother he hadn't kept, there were lines one just did not cross regardless), it had fallen to Ruby to scout on the internet for a hotel and book them a room since they wouldn't be making it by usual check-in times.

An abandoned house somewhere would have probably served them better, but going through the motions to find out would have been time wasted that they probably couldn't afford, and it was something never looked forward to after an eight plus hour drive. A shower, clean sheets, and electricity would be very welcomed.

"Two more lights and then you'll see a sign for the parking in back."

That was incredibly specific. He sent her another glance. "You know this place?"

"Yeah. It's why I picked it."

Sam's brow went up as she said nothing else, wondering what she was up to. Over the last few months, he'd learned a lot more about her personality than he had gleamed the whole previous year what with her only popping in for a few minutes here and there.

When you pretty much lived with someone twenty four seven, you were bound to pick up some information, no matter how tight lipped or good poker faced whoever might be. And he'd learned plenty. Ruby hadn't turned out exactly as he'd expected.

When she wasn't out hunting her own kind with an almost scary determination, she'd find pleasure at the simplest things. Sometimes she'd even smile at something beautiful, looking almost guilty whenever he caught her in the act. Like his brother, she could be incredibly impatient. And she definitely didn't take it well when things didn't go her way. She also had a very dry sense of humor that surprised him on occasion.

He spotted the sign Ruby warned him about, turned in and parked the Impala in a vacant spot. Ruby slipped out of the car and left him to grab their bags though she could have easily carried them all herself and more.

Going up a set of white wooden stairs, they ended up street side. Sam glanced up at the hotel's huge vertical marquee, which ran a good three stories -- the Astoria Hotel. Tons of neon and almost an eye sore. It reminded him of signs for movie theaters back in the 50's and 60's. The neon had seven stars, he assumed either for luck or to imply how much better they were to four star hotels, except the one at the bottom wasn't working. The number left, six, didn't make him think of luck at all, but rather of another set of numbers no one thought lucky at all and hit way too close to home lately – 666.

The lobby was filled with even more neon, forcing him to scrunch his eyes so as not to go blind -- neon of palm trees, slippers, cars, you name it. Even the reception desk was framed in red and blue neon stripes. Ruby sauntered up to it and got them their key. She threw him a half grin as she then led the way to the elevator.

More neon. It was starting to give him a headache. The doors dinged and opened up into a long corridor with dark, beat up wood paneling and thankfully no neon. The rooms had small red plastic plaques in the shape of card suits with the room numbers in white. Tacky as that seemed, he couldn't help but feel a little odd as he noticed theirs for room 207 – it was a heart. Though it shouldn't have meant anything, the small woman beside him was his lover, whether purely physical or not, and it gave him pause.

There had only been three women in his life he'd honestly ever felt close to or loved – Jess, Sarah, and Madison. Two he'd had sexual relations with, one he'd kept his distance despite temptation, at the time still dealing with Jess's loss and his inadvertent part in it. To Dean sex was a form of stress relief, intimacy without strings, a way to grab a little pleasure out of life as they went about their work.

Sam had never been able to look at it that way, had always wanted, needed more. The act just didn't hold as much pleasure or meaning if he wasn't committed on an emotional level to his partner as well.

What he had with Ruby though, it didn't fit either mold. It was more of a combination of the two. Release, physical as well as emotional, connecting with someone, sharing, having a common goal, yet there wasn't love. But it still filled a hole inside him. For him as well as for her, it seemed.

That first time had been pure need, like with Madison – rough, long, desperate. Yet without the same connection, the same depth. But like Madison, and unlike with Jessica, Ruby knew who he was, what he did. Unlike Madison, Ruby was aware of all his secrets, the biggest being the fact he wasn't necessarily strictly human, and it made no difference to her. She didn't think of him as a freak, as an abomination to be destroyed, but as someone special. And that she wanted him, despite or because of what he was, had been the biggest salve his soul could have received. Whether he could totally deal with it or not.

Ruby opened the door to the room and went inside. Sam stopped at the threshold in shock as he got his first glimpse of it.

Eyes wide, he took in the brown and yellow tiger print wallpapered walls, the dark glaring red carpet, the lime green couch with dark green cushions, the red tinted step pyramid lamp shades, and the thing that made his eye twitch, the mirrored ceiling over the whole of it. Dean would have been ecstatic. Sam was just horrified.

"You said you've stayed here before?" And she came back willingly? He had a hard time keeping the utter disbelief out of his voice. Guess there were still things to learn about Ruby.

She turned to look at him a mischievous smile on her face. "What? This is too posh for you?"

He couldn't tell if she was kidding. He hoped to heck she was. "Uh, totally in bad taste comes more to mind." He dumped the duffels on the floor, trying hard not to look up at his image on the ceiling. It was like that city in Ohio all over again. At least there didn't seem to be any magic finger machines. Dean would have been disappointed at that. The thought gave him an internal pang.

"You really have to learn to unwind, Sam."

"Right…"

Half dreading what he'd find, he moved left for the open door there to check out the bathroom. It'd been colored a vivid, pulsating red – the walls _and_ the ceiling. The glaring white of the tub, sink, and toilet he could see from the doorway hurt his eyes with the stark contrast. He thought he might prefer the neon. He backed out of there in a hurry. He supposed it was too late to try to find somewhere else. The long drive had pretty much done him in.

"I mean, with all the things after us, trying to kill us, it'd be a shame if you died from a brain aneurism caused by being too uptight."

He sent her a disbelieving look then shook his head. "And you really thought this place would help me relax?" Not even after a full bottle of Jack Daniel's might he achieve that in this place. He felt another pang, deep inside, realizing once more how much of a kick his brother would have gotten out of the horrid place.

Sam rolled his neck, trying to let go of more than one kind of exhaustion. He almost sighed with pleasure as Ruby's able hands kneaded his shoulders from behind unasked.

"We should rest before we go looking around town. And I know just how to get _you_ to do that." Her hands slid down his arms, then snaked over his chest, her body pressing against his back. His pulse quickened, not taking much imagination to figure out what she probably had in mind. But was that what he wanted?

Her hands slowly slid lower.

Certain treacherous parts of him hardened in response, making their answer plain, caring nothing about demons or morals or emotional attachments.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

The old car didn't perform as badly as Dean expected, but he still had to baby the engine off and on as it wasn't made for the kind of speeds or duration he wanted to squeeze out of it. After driving all day and a large chunk of the night, he pulled over somewhere around Sioux Falls and tried to grab a nap in the lumpy back seat.

Despite thinking he was tired enough after the events earlier that day – being reborn, strafed by some weird ass invisible something who tried to rupture his ears out, not being able to get a hold of his brother, being threatened by Bobby on the phone – he'd expected to sleep like the dead. Instead he didn't get much rest, jerking awake out of memory filled nightmares or what if's, his heart trying to stop in his chest as each time he thought he'd been either dragged back to hell again or he found out Sammy was dead.

Even his filched copy of Busty Asian Beauties hadn't been enough to distract him for long.

Yet when he finally hit the familiar stretch on Route 14 as the sun crept up the horizon and then later when he made the turnoff toward Singer Salvage, it all just faded away behind him like it meant nothing. Despite their nomadic lives and never spending more than a couple of days at Bobby's at a time, seeing the fading sign as he came to the gate overwhelmed him with such a flooding sense of nostalgia and home coming he was forced to wipe at his eyes.

He parked the old car and ran to the door off the kitchen on the right side of the house, knowing a friendly face and answers waited beyond the closed door. The fact that Bobby had been weird on the phone and Sam's cell was disconnected were like mosquitoes biting at him all the way here, but he was about to give them a good spraying and get rid of them for good in less than a minute. His heart hammered in his chest just at the thought of it.

He banged heavily on the door, needing, wanting to see someone who was familiar right there and then. His breath caught in his throat as he heard steps coming closer from the other side. Then the knob turned and the door swung open, his eagerness and need rising inside him like a physical thing.

Joy suffused his every pore as his gaze fell on the beloved grizzled face, the fading green cap proclaiming him a Death Valley Rebel, the worn wizened brown eyes, the close cropped beard. Dean sighed in utter relief and contentment. He was home, he was finally home. "Surprise."

Bobby stared at him as if he'd been sucker punched. The man was actually robbed of words for once. Bobby took half a step back away from him. "I…I don't…"

Dean knew exactly where Bobby's coming from. "Yeah, me neither." His heart soared with guilty pleasure as he crossed the threshold, never having thought he'd ever set foot in the old place again. "But here I am."

He glanced past Bobby, hoping to catch a glimpse of Sam somewhere in there, his brother the most pressing matter on his list. Had the Sasquatch gotten taller since he was gone? Had Sammy missed him? Where was that boy? Nothing he had gone through would be worth shit if Sam wasn't okay. But he saw no sign of him from what he could see of the kitchen and adjoining study.

Then Bobby's arm unexpectedly shot out with a silver knife at the end of it and Dean was forced to jerk back or get a new appendage. He blocked Bobby's thrust before grabbing his friend's arm and wrist and tried to twist them behind his back. "Bobby!"

Dean was more shocked than hurt as the old codger then hit him in the face with the back of his fist. Dean stumbled farther into the house, horrified this was even happening and not wanting to hurt his friend or be hurt by him. "Bobby, it's me!"

"My ass!"

Dean saw anger and something deeper flash in his eyes as he came at him with the knife again. Bobby was out for blood.

"Whoa, whoa, wait!" Dean grabbed a chair from the kitchenette, having been backed up all the way to the end of the green kitchen, and placed it between them. This was definitely not the homecoming he'd been hoping for. He raised up his hand as if it could actually keep an enraged Bobby at bay, but he didn't know what else to do. His body was coiled, ready to flee or fight depending on whatever happened next. There had to be a way to talk some sense into the man. "Your name is Robert Steven Singer. You became a hunter after your wife got possessed." And now for the ace up his sleeve -- a truth that as a man he'd never thought he'd ever actually have to admit to. "You're about the closest thing I have to a father."

He saw the older man hesitate.

"Bobby. It's _me_." How the hell did you prove who you were to someone who didn't want to believe? Was it really that hard to know him for who he was? Dean let go of the chair and straightened up, his gaze never leaving Bobby.

The older man still looked stricken but the mad look had left his eyes and the knife was now pointed toward the floor. Bobby took a step forward and shoved the chair aside. Dean wasn't sure if that was because his friend believed him or so he could get a better shot at him, but he let him do it anyway. Wary, he watched Bobby as the latter reached out with his free hand as if wanting to make sure Dean was really there. His fingers touched him on the shoulder, grabbing on, then Bobby looked him right in the eye.

Dean felt something loosen inside him. Bobby was finally seeing the light. A half embarrassed, half shit eating grin flickered on his face, still not entirely able to accept the man had attacked him in the first place. Then his instincts kicked in and saved him again as he felt Bobby's arm suddenly tense. His friend made another thrust at him with the knife.

He was able to dodge and he pushed Bobby's arm away again, this time getting him turned around, his knife arm pulled up behind him. "I'm not a shapeshifter!"

"Then you're a revenant!"

A jolt of annoyance rocked through him. He'd had about enough of this crap. He pushed Bobby away, taking the knife from him. "All right. If I was either, would I do _this_ with a silver knife?"

Dean pulled up his outer shirt sleeve as he spoke, exposing his upper arm. With Bobby staring right at him, he took a deep breath, wondering how the heck he'd gotten into this and what lengths he sometimes had to go through to make people see sense. Grimacing, he slid the knife across his arm. He was quite happy, deep inside, to note he still bled like normal people, another of those mosquitoes he'd been attempting to ignore. Trying not to give into the burning pain he received for his trouble, he glanced up at Bobby's disbelieving face.

"Uhhh, Dean…?"

"That's what I've been trying to tell you." Hoping against hope, he stepped forward, trying to catch his breath, the wound stinging like the dickens.

Bobby's face half fell, as if finally daring to believe he might be telling the truth, because to believe him was to admit to pain, which confused the heck out of Dean. He also struggled to catch his breath but for different reasons. Bobby stepped forward too, and though Dean still tried to watch for any more signs of duplicity, he suddenly found himself wrapped in a fierce unashamed hug.

Finally!

Dean returned it, giving as good as he got, amazed and a little frightened by what he'd just seen flash in his friend's face. He was sorry he'd been the cause of it, and bunched his hands in Bobby's shirt just glad the older man at last believed him. To be back and having Bobby doubt him had stirred up awful feelings he didn't even want to think about – like maybe he'd not wanted Dean back, or he knew things Dean didn't want him to. He closed his eyes for a moment, wallowing in the human contact, one that was wanted and reciprocated, not forced on him or others or followed by the tip of a sharp claw or knife.

Bobby let him go and Dean pulled back, a part of him whispering that he didn't deserve this. "It's good to see you, boy."

"You, too." Dean reached out and shook Bobby's shoulder, more loath than he would ever say to having to let go.

Wonder laced Bobby's next set of words. "But how did you get out?"

"I don't know." He looked away, disappointed and a little unnerved that Bobby didn't have the answer. He half turned from him, not wanting him to see this, and used it as an excuse to set the silver knife down on the kitchen table, a nice safe distance from Bobby's reach, before moving to turn back around. "I just woke up in a pine box—"

Dean was interrupted as cold water splashed out of nowhere to slap his face and hair. It dribbled off him as he turned his face to the side to spit out the dose that had fallen into his open mouth while he'd been speaking. Was it really so bloody hard to _believe_ he was _back_? "I'm not a demon either, you know." Not yet anyway…

Bobby gave him a half shrug, holding up the bottle of holy water. "Sorry. Can't be too careful."

Dean wasn't sure if he wanted to throttle him or hug him again, so he did neither.

Bobby brushed past him and pulled a dish towel off the oven door and handed it out to him in a conciliatory gesture. Dean yanked it off the offered hand and dried his face, still not too happy about his reception, though he really couldn't blame the man. They walked out of the green kitchen back toward the red and gold wallpapered study. He draped the used towel over his shoulder.

"That don't make a lick of sense."

Dean sighed, sure he was talking about the fact he'd woken up inside his own coffin with no clue as to how he got there. "You're preaching to the choir."

Bobby turned around to face him on the other side of his desk. "Dean, your chest was ribbons. Your insides were slop and you've been buried for four months." Brown eyes raked over him again as if the words themselves were making him doubt Dean was really there again. "Even if you could slip out of Hell and back into your meat suit…"

"Yeah, I know, I should look like a Thriller video reject." Though he was darn glad he didn't.

Bobby's voice got quiet. "What do you remember?"

Dean kept his gaze lowered, this being one of the many topics he'd wracked his brain over on the way to South Dakota. "Not much." Actually way too much. "I remember I was a hellhound's chew toy." A sad but real truth. "And then lights out." Another truth. "Then I came to six feet under. That was it." If you only looked at 'soul with a body' memories. Otherwise there was a whole other package edited for content.

He kept a veiled eye on Bobby as the other sat down, trying to see how his friend absorbed all this. It was a dry test run in a manner of speaking. But he needed to move onto what he really cared anything about. The one thing he most dreaded asking, but had to. "Sam's number is not working. He's, ah, he's not…"

"Oh, he's alive. Far as I know."

Thank God! Though he'd not dared believe otherwise, it had been a fear peeking at him from the back of his mind. It wasn't like when he died his kid brother had been in the best of situations. Lilith had had him pined to a wall, laughing as she got ready to kill him, Dean already but a footnote in her day. If Sam had died and yet Dean had somehow escaped the pit… He couldn't bear to even think about it.

"Ah, good." He wasn't too late. He'd get to see Sammy again. The joy at the thought made him smile despite himself. Dean came around the desk, a cold shiver dampening his previous pleasure, the last of Bobby's words finally trickling through his brain. "What do you mean, as far as you know?"

"I haven't talked to him for months…"

Though the words were calm and nonchalant, Dean couldn't help notice how his friend had turned his face away from him. "You're kidding. You just let him go off by himself?" When a hundred or more demons were busting for his brother's intestines on a stick?

"He was dead set on it." Bobby got up out of the chair and turned his back on him.

None of this was making any sense. Sam couldn't possibly handle all those demons on his own. "Bobby, you should have been looking after him." He regretted the hasty accusing words the moment they left his mouth, knowing his friend better than that.

Bobby twisted around, looking at first as if he'd struck him then angry. "I _tried_. These last few months haven't been exactly easy you know. For him _or_ me."

They hadn't been easy for anyone. But Dean couldn't admit that.

"We had to _bury_ you." The statement screamed of things not said.

Dean decided to backpedal in a hurry. "Why did you bury me anyway?"

Bobby half shrugged. "I wanted you salted and burned, usual drill. But Sam wouldn't have it."

Dean wasn't sure what to make of this either. There seemed to be a whole lot Bobby wasn't saying. He could sense it. "Well, I'm glad he won that one."

Another half shrug. "He said you'd need a body when he got you back home somehow."

Had Sam had a contingency plan that far back?

"That's about _all_ he said."

That didn't sound like his brother. "What do you mean?"

"He was quiet." Bobby's eyes grew dark. "Real quiet." He sat down on the edge of the desk. "Then he just took off. Wouldn't return my calls. I tried to find him but, he didn't want to be found."

A pit opened inside Dean. This wasn't Sam. What the hell had he done? "Aw, dammit, Sammy." He wiped at his brow, uneasiness growing in his gut, not believing his little brother could have gone there.

"What?" Bobby stared over at him.

"Oh, he got me home okay." He was going to tear his lying brother a new one when he found him. "But whatever he did, it's bad mojo."

"What makes you so sure?" Bobby's neutral tone told Dean he too had already been thinking along these lines. And Dean didn't have anything that would reassure either of them.

"You should have seen the grave site. It was like a nuke went off. Then there was this force, this presence that, I don't know, blew past me at a fill-up joint." He touched his head trying to put what he felt back then into words and falling short. He pulled the towel off his shoulder and followed it with his outer shirt. "And then this."

Dean pulled up on the left sleeve of his t-shirt and showed Bobby the angry red hand print.

Bobby's gaze stuck to it like glue as he got up and came closer. "What in the hell?"

"Looks like a demon just yanked me out or rode me out." Dean shrugged, not looking at the brand, creeped out every time he thought about it.

"But why?"

"To hold up their end of the bargain." Just saying the words out loud brought up bile in his throat.

"You think Sam made a deal."

Their eyes met. "It's what I would have done." Had done. Would probably do again if necessary, his soul already doomed. "We gotta find him and make this right."

Bobby shook his head. "But how?"

"I need to use your phone."

Bobby led him back into the kitchen and handed Dean a big black clunker off the side table in there.

Dean quickly punched in an 800 number he'd memorized a long while back after one too many disappearing acts by little brother. The other end was answered by customer service and Dean cut them off before they got too far into their spiel. "Hi, I've got a phone account with you guys and I lost my phone. Wondering if you could turn the GPS on for me."

"May I have the account name please?" You could almost sense the boredom oozing from the other end.

"Yeah, Wedge Antilles." Dean wanted to pace, to force her to hurry, to smack Sam on the side of the head for being so stupid.

"Hold on a moment. For security reasons, could I have the last four digits of the social security please?"

"Social is 2474." Come on, come on.

"Yes, it's active."

"Thank you." He hung up the phone and put it down. The more he thought about it the surer he was Sammy had done a bad thing. Sam had promised him he wouldn't do this. That he would break the chain. Dean rushed off to Bobby's study to use his friend's computer.

"How'd you know he'd use that name?"

"You kidding me? What don't I know about that kid." Star Wars had been one of their favorite movies _ever_. They'd seen the thing one night on TV and then hunted down the others once they'd found out from their father there were more. Sam had latched onto Wedge out of all the characters in the story with a vengeance. The non-featured outsider that made a difference – first by saving Luke from the TIE fighter he couldn't shake, later by flying a snow speeder as Rouge Squadron fought the Imperial ground troops to keep the force field generators active while the Rebel transports tried to make a safe getaway. He was even an important player as one of the leaders in the assault on the second Death Star when the Rebellion attacked it en mass. Add in the X-Wing books and Dark Horse comics focusing on Antilles and Sammy's attachment to the character had gone wild. Personally, he much preferred Han Solo, who got the luscious Princess Leia, but to each their own.

Cut off from everyone and everything, he couldn't think of any other name Sammy would use.

Dean brought the internet up and did a search for Arc Mobile. As he waited for the sign on page to pull up, he noticed that there seemed to be an awful lot of empty liquor bottles on Bobby's desk. It wasn't like him.

"Hey, Bobby… What's the deal with the liquor store?" He picked up one of the bottles and looked at the label – Gilbert Hadrian Black Scotch Whiskey – strong stuff. "Hm?" He flashed the bottle in his friend's direction to punctuate the question. "Parents out of town or something?"

Sure Bobby took a drink now and again, they all did. But this many bottles sitting around like permanent fixtures as if they were some of his books or packets of herbs, and so many in just four months? This was something else.

"Like I said. The last few months ain't been all that easy."

Dean stared dead at him as he spoke in that calm voice again, getting the distinct feeling that there really was a whole boatful of stuff not being said. He wasn't all that important. Had never been. Surely his loss couldn't have hit them that hard. "Right."

He logged onto the website and hit the locator button on the GPS feature for Sam's phone. A map popped up with its current location – 263 Adams Road Pontiac, Illinois. Dean was surprised, but then thinking about what his brother had done, he really shouldn't have been. Had he come looking for him at the grave site and found him gone? He must be frantic. "Sam's in Pontiac, Illinois."

Bobby mirrored his own surprise. "Right near where you were planted."

"Right where I popped up – hell of a coincidence, don't you think?" He could feel a burning in the pit of his stomach. Sammy, just what had you done?


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

The warm water cascaded over Sam's head and down his shoulders working at his tired muscles. While the hotel might be something out of a nightmare, at least their water heaters seemed to be up to speed. The closet for the shower, though, an obvious recent addition if the old white porcelain tub was any indication, was barely able to hold him, let alone was tall enough for him.

Half squatting under a shower head was nothing new to him though. Not after that final growth spurt around seventeen. It'd been awesome to pass Dean's height and look down on his big brother after all those years and short jokes, but there had definitely been some drawbacks.

He reached blindly for his bottle of shampoo.

The day had been a total waste. He and Ruby had driven all over town looking for signs of the demons they were chasing, but everything had been incredibly quiet. There'd been no trace of them whatsoever. They'd scoured the papers, police radio frequencies, even the local rumor mills and all had come up empty. As far as everyone here was concerned, life was the same old same old, nothing out of the ordinary at all. It made no sense. Something had to have drawn those demons here. What did they know that he and Ruby didn't?

He let the question follow the shampoo bubbles down the drain, knowing that at the moment there was nothing he could do about it. After some hot food and more sleep, they would start over again in the morning. If Ruby had any ideas, maybe they might hit a couple of more spots tonight. It wasn't like this bunch to go underground like this. They'd been leaving a definite trail of chaos and mayhem behind them which was how they'd followed them to Tennessee in the first place. But no matter how deep to ground they may have gone, he would eventually find them. Of that he had no doubt whatsoever.

Sam turned off the water and twisted and turned to get out of the small space before he could grab a towel off the rack. The red walls glared at him and he tried his best to ignore them. He caught his wet reflection in the mirror and that of the amulet hanging around his neck. He took hold of it for a moment and squeezed, letting the thing's horns bite into his hand. No, they wouldn't get away. He would make sure. Every last one of those bastards would pay for what had been taken from him.

He let his hatred burn through him for a moment then let it go. The heat of it would drive him, push him to succeed, but he had to control it, rather than let it consume him like it had his father, or eventually he'd be no good to anyone at all. He knew what it was like. He'd almost allowed it to do that to him the first time, almost let it burn him up with the rage and guilt he felt after Jessica's death. Back then he'd thought it could never be worse than what that had felt like. But he'd been wrong, very very wrong. But he would prove the stronger for it. There were promises to himself he meant to keep, despite the fact he'd not been able to keep those he'd made to others.

Sam slipped on his underwear, then put on his gray t-shirt hiding the amulet beneath it so it would stay close to his skin -- a reminder of all his failures. Socks and jeans followed, then the small silver knife tucked to the small of his back, leaving the second one where it lay beneath the bar of soap in the shower. He heard a banging from the front of the hotel room. Hopefully it meant the food was here. He walked out of the room, his damp hair sticking to his face, looking forward to the meal and the strategizing for the morrow.

As he opened the door to step out into the room and heard the sound of voices, he hoped for the sake of the delivery boy that Ruby wasn't pulling one of her usual stunts. She seemed to get a perverse glee in watching guys ogle over her as she tried to make them as uncomfortable as humanly possible, pretending she wasn't half stripped in front of them. Another odd little secret he'd learned from hanging around her all the time.

She wouldn't be dissuaded either, calling it one of her small pleasures. And she wasn't averse to playing these games on him either. Probably the main reason she'd gone for the mirrored ceiling and the lacy bras she'd taken to throwing about the hotel rooms they went to whether she ever wore them or not.

He spotted her at the room's open door, wearing nothing but a gray sports bra and matching panty shorts. Looked like she was holding back tonight. "Hey, is –"

He walked past the door catching a glimpse of who was on the other side and stopped dead, his brain going blank.

Dean.

It was Dean.

_It was DEAN_.

He remembered to breathe as he realized he was looking at his fondest wish come true. He noticed Bobby was there as well and glanced at him, his brain screaming at the impossibility and utter awesomeness of it all, thoughts clashing inside him into a giant jumble. He frowned a question at the older man, joy starting to well inside him as his eyes moved again to drink in the sight of his brother alive and well.

"Hey, Sammy."

The bright hazel eyes, the freckled face, the quirky half smile, the confident stance. Dean, back, whole.

But it wasn't possible.

Sam's chest constricted in pain, his breath growing short. This couldn't be his brother. He knew it couldn't be. He'd completed the research, he'd tried to make the deals, to open the gate, he'd done everything that could be done and more and there had never been any chance of Dean being brought back once Lilith took him. There was no possible _way_ to bring Dean back from the pit -- from the suffering and hell he'd committed his soul to on Sam's behalf. _None_.

Lilith was toying with him. She had somehow found out he and Ruby were following after the others and decided to have some fun at his expense. She was cruelly showing him the one thing he wanted more than anything yet could never have again, probably in the hopes it would get close enough and he'd hesitate long enough for it to do her job for her and get rid of him.

Loathing flashed through his body burning every inch of him. It was better than feeling the agony of hopes dashed to pieces yet again.

Sam barely noticed Ruby get out of the way as the mockery of his brother stepped forward.

He wouldn't allow this. This travesty had to stop. His rage sang inside him telling him what needed to be done. He grabbed the small silver knife he'd tucked away in the small of his back and lunged. He pushed the fake Dean back as the latter fought to keep his knife arm from coming down. Sam put every last once of pressure behind it, wanting this done, wanting this physical reminder of what he desired most destroyed and out of his life forever.

Ruby squealed in surprise adding an unexpected sense of surrealism to the scene, like something straight out of his worst nightmares. Shock splashed him like acid as out of nowhere Bobby, Bobby who'd wanted to accept Dean was dead, Bobby who'd wanted his body salted and burned, Bobby who knew more than anyone how impossible it was to bring back his brother, clamped onto his arm and body and forcibly pulled him back.

Mind reeling, still fighting against Bobby's grip and the nightmarish vision before him, Sam fought to make his numbed mind work. "Who are you?"

"Like you didn't do this?"

The accusing tone was like a slap. This _thing_ was angry at _him_? "Do what?" His knife hand was free but he couldn't move enough to get at the monster. Bobby was draped on him like a net. Why was he protecting this _thing_?

Bobby's voice tumbled to his ear as if he'd read his mind. "It's him, Sam."

"No!" Dean was dead, dead, dead, dead! He saw him die. His saw his body get ripped to shreds. With his own hands he'd sewn what little there was left back together so he could bury him. "No."

"I've been through this already, Sam. It's really him."

He heard Bobby's words but didn't understand them. It wasn't possible. Then he stared again at the creature professing to be his brother, at the pained expression on its face, the sadness and disappointment at not being recognized flashing in its eyes.

Sam's rage left without a whimper, something in that face, in that expression blaring at him. Was there some chance? Something he'd not stumbled across? Could this be…Dean? "Wait…"

He barely felt it as Bobby mostly released him, his chest heaving as he tried to get his tortured brain around what they were telling him. If there was a chance this could really be his brother, dare he take it? Could he withstand finding out later they'd been made fools of and have to live with the fact once more that his brother was dead?

"I know." The familiar hazel eyes were pleading with him. His desperation was so easy to see Sam knew it couldn't be fake. "I look fantastic, huh?"

The false cheer, the glib comment, who the hell else could it be but Dean? Something inside him cracked. After months of what he'd thought were useless prayers, of keeping himself from giving into despair because he knew there was no hope, Dean was back again.

It was a miracle.

And if not, if he was just being taken for a ride, he'd just let the thing kill him because he'd rather be dead than find out it was a lie.

Sam stepped forward and wrapped his arms around his brother, what had to be his brother, feeling his warmth, his solidity, the returned embrace. Dean was here, really here. Despite _everything_. Though he'd failed him at every turn, broken almost every promise he'd ever made him, his brother was _back_.

Dean squeezed him even harder and it felt for once as if they were both of the same mind. Sam wasn't sure how much of it he could take. His eyes and chest burned. He wanted nothing more than to collapse right then and there and weep until he broke apart, but it couldn't be.

Again it was like they were both in tune as Dean pulled back from him at the same time he did. As if they both needed the space to pull themselves together, the moment proving too intense. His heart squeezed painfully inside him.

He stared at his brother. Their gazes met.

_His big brother was back_.

"So…are you two like together?"

Sam glanced at Ruby, totally lost, having forgotten she was there. "What?"

Then it hit him. Ruby, God, _Ruby_! This was so not the place and time to reveal her to Dean. "No!"

Unwanted, he flashed on the numerous other times in the last four years he and Dean had been mistaken for a couple. He felt an unexpected smile momentarily light upon his face, strangely pleased it had happened again because it meant Dean was truly _there, _with _him_. Dean was back. Their relationship could be misunderstood by others all over again. It made him giddy. And the look on Dean's face of utter disgust at the thought was glorious! "No. He's my brother."

Though he knew full well Ruby was more than aware of that fact.

"Oh. Oh, got it. I guess." She looked from one to the other of them as if not falling for any of it.

Ruby looked to be chocked full of hidden talents. And at least one of them was thinking clearly, because he knew he sure as hell was not. He'd have to tell her she deserved an Academy Award later. The last thing they needed right now, with Dean just fresh out of Hades, was to bring up the fact they had a demon amongst them, and one his brother absolutely did not like.

"Look, I should probably go."

"Yeah, yeah, that's probably a good idea." He'd never thought, never would have dreamed that he'd have to explain her presence to anyone and least of all to his brother. It was good she was keeping her wits about her. His brain was already so full he could barely think straight. "Sorry."

Sam turned his back to Bobby and Dean, feeling their stares on him, trying to force his numb brain to think. His heart filled with gratitude as Ruby made a big show of grabbing her clothes, (neat she was not!) and shoving others surreptitiously beneath the chair and black loveseat, even throwing him one of the new long sleeved shirts she'd bought him a week or so ago. She'd been making weird rumblings about his lack of fashion sense for a month, and then had decided to take matters into her own hands. He hadn't really minded, clothes not on his priority list and her buying them one less thing for him to have to care about.

For some reason, though, despite the kink this threw into their plans, he had the sneaking suspicion she was enjoying this.

He watched her strut around as he walked her to the door, half fearing she might decide to try…something. It wasn't like there was any love lost between her and Dean. He doubted she'd think twice about dropping a bomb like this on him. Sam just didn't have the vaguest idea how he'd go about stopping her if she decided to do it. Luckily for him, she didn't.

"So, call me." If he hadn't known her, he would have thought the eager, half desperate look on her face to be genuine.

Sam leaned against the doorway, still feeling like he was two steps behind. Ruby might be letting Dean take her place, but she wasn't letting go. Good. They had plans. Dean back or not, there were things that still needed taking care of. He just wasn't sure how the heck he was going to make it work.

He could feel Dean and Bobby's stares all over them from inside the room. "Yeah, yeah, sure thing, Kathy." The line felt awkward and shallow even to his numbed brain.

Ruby's face fell. "Kristy."

That sense of the surreal slapped him full force again. It was as if they were play acting a scene out of Dean's past. Hysterical laughter tried to bubble up his throat. "Right."

It was truly hard to keep it reeled in. Once he got started, he would most likely never stop until he was dead.

Ruby's jilted smile and pout combination almost shoved him off the edge.

This would never work! He was way in over his head with no way out. He closed the door slowly, not turning from it immediately. Life had suddenly gotten incredibly complicated, but to be honest, it was really hard at the moment to mind all that much.

He twisted around and looked at the one thing which made it all worthwhile – Dean. He'd just have to find a way. Because now that he had him back, there was no way he would repeat his mistakes and not make sure by whatever means necessary that he kept him by his side and alive this time.

Sam walked over and sat on the edge of the loveseat to put his shoes on, surreptitiously noticing Dean's tense posture and crossed arms. Something was up, as he'd seen that displeased expression before, but he looked away, not wanting to get into whatever it was just yet, by necessity having to take the fact his brother was alive and well in small doses or otherwise his brain might fry.

"So, tell me, what'd it cost?"

Sam glanced up wondering why Dean sounded so serious. Did he suspect something? Already? "The girl?" He tried to hide his rising nervousness behind a smile and used one of his brother's own methods of not dealing with things against him. "I don't pay, Dean."

"That's not funny, Sam." The displeased expression deepened. Dean suspected something. "To bring _me back_."

That brought Sam up short. Dean thought he'd done this? A quick glance at Bobby where he sat on the couch by the window, the red neon of the hotel's sign flooding inside, showed him the older man believed the same thing.

"Was it just your soul or was it something worse?" Dean's stare was hard.

Sam felt a guilty twinge. "You think I made a deal?"

The answer, unexpectedly, came from Bobby. "That's exactly what we think."

And they thought he'd wait for months before he did it? "Well, I didn't." He slipped on his other shoe, conflicting emotions rising inside him, not sure whether to be flattered they were giving him so much credit or angry they'd thought him responsible at all.

What Dean said next punched him hard in the gut, made all the worse by the fact it was true, though not about this specifically.

"Don't lie to me." The deep hurt-sad look was back on his face.

Sam didn't like it. "I'm not lying."

"So what, now I'm off the hook and you're on, is that it? Just some demon's bitch boy?" The fact Dean thought this was exactly how it was going down radiated from him in waves. "I didn't want to be saved like this."

Dean's ire rubbed Sam raw, reopening wounds he'd best have liked to leave closed. The amulet underneath his shirt felt very heavy. He rose to his feet and faced his brother. "No, Dean, I wish I had done it. All right?"

His brother came at him and grabbed his shirt in both fists, his face coming close to his, every muscle, every look, every breath, insisting he didn't believe him -- that he _knew_ Sam had thrown his life away for him. The irony was as amazing as it was bitter. "There's no other way this could have gone down. Now tell the truth."

Sam pushed his brother's hands away, the old guilt and ugly knowledge of his inability rising to smother him from the inside. "I tried everything. And _that's_ the truth. I tried opening the Devil's Gate. Hell, I tried to bargain, Dean, but no demon would deal. All right?"

Each word was an acid pill. They were things he would have preferred never to have said, never to admit to, but having Dean credit him with his salvation when he had in truth so miserably failed at every turn felt worse. And Bobby had fallen into it just as badly. He'd betrayed the man, cut him entirely out, and it had been useless all the same. They both might as well understand how far he'd not gotten despite his best intentions.

He saw Dean's confidence fracture.

"You were in hell for months, _for months_. And I couldn't stop it. So I'm sorry it wasn't me, _all right_?" He'd said it. He'd actually said it. There, his shame exposed for all to see. He looked down, not wanting to see the horror, the disappointment, the anger, the dawning comprehension on his brother's face that he'd failed him. "Dean, I'm sorry."

"It's okay, Sammy." Dean's voice sounded thick, the anger gone, but Sam didn't dare make anything of it. "You don't have to apologize. I believe you."

In some ways that just made it worse. It wouldn't be something he would ever forget or forgive himself for, even if Dean decided to. He had _failed_. But now that he'd somehow been given a second chance, he wouldn't do so again.

Bobby spoke up from the other side of the room. "Don't get me wrong. I'm glad that Sam's soul remains intact. But it does raise a sticky question."

Sam glanced up at him and then at Dean.

"If he didn't pull me out, then what did?" His brother locked stares with him, the question like a yawning pit between them.

And Sam didn't have the faintest idea how to cross it.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Dean sat down on the loud room's coffee table, not feeling too steady at the moment. He'd thought Sam was the one responsible for bringing him back. But he wasn't. And like at Bobby's place, words were being spoken, things were being admitted to, but it was obvious that oh so much still wasn't being said.

Bobby sat on the weird leafed patterned green couch, as loathe as any of them to broach what was now on all their minds after his little bombshell of a few moments before.

Sam had muttered something and walked off and Dean absently remembered seeing him picking up stuff as he worked his way toward the small refrigerator in the corner behind the main door. There was just too damn much to assimilate -- as if being yanked out of hell wasn't enough to overflow the brain. And every time one question got answered or he got something crossed off the list, more came along to get piled on top.

It'd been bad enough to live with only his own thoughts and guilt on that fourteen hour ride to Bobby's yesterday, but then to have gotten there only to find out Sam wasn't there and that they had to drive all the way back to Pontiac again had been excruciating. Still, the shower at his place and getting clean clothes had done so much to set things right. Except for the dead knowledge eating at him that Sam had broken his promise, that he'd made some kind of deal to get him out. He'd worked himself up pretty good on that alone, but nothing had gone even close to what he'd envisioned since they got here.

Dean rubbed at his face, drained and exhausted. He straightened up as Sam came back and took the beer his brother offered him. Sam handed another to Bobby and held onto a third for himself. Dean guessed it was time to start pushing. Things as they stood still weren't making too much sense. "So, what were you doing around here if you weren't digging me out of my grave?"

Sam sat down on the edge of the loveseat again. "Well, once I figured out I couldn't save you, uhm…"

It didn't escape Dean how his brother wouldn't stare directly at him for long, but did so in short flickers, eyebrows going up and down as if he too was having problems assimilating everything. Guess he wasn't alone in that respect. There was a whole lot to take in.

"I started hunting down Lilith, trying to get some payback."

He did _what_? And alone! Dean couldn't look at him -- a different kind of anger now smoldering inside. Had his sacrifice meant so little Sammy had decided to go postal and run after Lilith on his own?

Bobby said exactly what Dean was thinking. "All by yourself? Who do you think you are? Your old man?"

"Uh…"

Yeah, let's see you talk your way out of that one, _college boy_.

"Sorry, Bobby, I should have made sure to call but I was pretty messed up."

Dean got up as Sam bumbled out his apology, wanting to grab him and shake him till his arms dropped. All that he'd suffered, all that he'd gone through and done, and his brother had just callously cut out everyone and everything and been hunting down demons on his own? What was he? _ Suicidal_?

He spotted something just peeking out from under the end of the loveseat and walked over to it, trying to focus his mind on anything but what he was feeling at the moment. He bent over to pick it up. It was a lacy bra. Before he could think about what he might say, he held the thing out for the others to see, his mouth opening up wanting to vent some of what was rolling inside him. "Oh yeah, I really feel your pain."

Sam had ditched Bobby, drove the man to drink when he cut their friend totally out of his life, not even letting him know if he was alive or dead, the one man who could have made sure he stayed okay, that would assure Sammy didn't just throw away what Dean had given him. And this was what he did with his time. Yet lurid affairs weren't Sammy's style. They were his. His brother was all about the 'relationship' and the touchy feely stuff. What was going on with him that would make him _do_ this? Surely he wasn't that broken. Not like he'd been after Sammy died…

Dean sat down on the loveseat beside his brother, thinking maybe there was more to this than he knew. He suddenly just wanted to be close to him, hoping to hell and back that four months hadn't changed his brother to the point where he didn't know him anymore. Sam mercifully ignored his ugly comment, and Dean thought that was alright. He really shouldn't have said it in the first place.

"Anyways, ah, I was tracking these demons out of Tennessee and out of nowhere they all just left and booked up here."

"When?" Bobby leaned forward.

"Yesterday morning." Sam sounded relieved the topic had moved on.

Dean glanced at Bobby. "When I busted out."

Dark eyes stared into his own. "You think these demons are here 'cause of you?"

Bobby was right, it did sound somewhat conceited of him to think that, yet the more he mulled the idea over the more right it felt.

"But why?"

For some reason Sammy's question hit him wrong, but he clamped down on it not letting it show. It was as if Sam had echoed Dean's own feelings of inadequacy. Regardless of that, he was sure he was onto something. Too many coincidences too close. "Well, I dunno, some badass demon drags me out and now this? It's gotta be connected somehow."

He might be reaching, but it made too much sense. Dean glanced at Bobby trying to see what he thought about his theory. The old hunter had a pensive look on his face. When he spoke, though, Dean got something totally different instead.

"How are you feeling, anyway?"

The question seemed to come out of nowhere. But knowing Bobby, and assuming it was somehow relevant, Dean gave it some thought anyway. "I'm a little hungry."

"No. I mean, do you feel like yourself? Anything strange or different?"

Were they back to this crap again? "Or demonic?" His rising annoyance only went up when his friend just shrugged at this. "Bobby, how many times do I have to prove I'm me?"

"Yeah, well, listen, no demon is lifting you loose out of the goodness of their heart." His expression turned deadly serious. "They gotta have something nasty planned."

Dean couldn't help but roll his eyes at the melodrama and looked away, exasperation flashing through him mixed with a bolt of fear which he tried to pretend wasn't there. He didn't want them to have doubts about him, about his 'true self'. He'd done plenty of that about Sammy when he got brought back thanks to the whisperings of that damn YED, and it'd almost driven him crazy. He was already f'd up enough by the things he'd done and seen downstairs; he didn't need them making him think he might be some kind of time bomb, too. He couldn't afford to. Not for his sake or theirs. "Well, I feel fine."

He took another drag of his beer to prove it.

Sam spoke up. "Okay, look. We don't know what they're planning. All we got is a pile of questions and no shovel. We need help."

Dean had no idea where the heck they'd get that. Ruby was gone or dead, and it wouldn't be like he'd want her help anyway, even if she somehow knew anything. If Bobby had no clue, they just might be up a creek without a paddle.

He shouldn't have worried. Bobby came through for them again.

"I know a psychic a few hours from here. Something this big, maybe she's heard the other side talking."

Dean felt a burst of hope. The devastation he'd seen at his gravesite had to have made an impression on somebody. "Hell, yeah, it's worth a shot."

Anything to get moving, to get going, to get answers. Making sure he wouldn't somehow be hurting Sam by being back.

Bobby rose to his feet. "I'll be right back."

Dean set his beer down and got up as well, thinking this would be a good time to use the bathroom.

"Hey, wait." Sam stood up beside him.

Dean stared at him wondering if they were about to have a moment, and not entirely sure that for once, he would be all that averse to having it. There'd just been so much so fast and there were still so many questions, so many things he wanted to know about. But asking would bring up questions from the other side as well, questions about things he wouldn't, couldn't share.

"You probably want this back." Sam reached inside his shirt collar and pulled out something from beneath his t-shirt before bringing it up over his head.

Dean felt a jolt, wondering if it could possibly be what he thought it was.

Sam laid the familiar bronze horned head with its big ears and swirl symbol on its forehead onto his hand and Dean felt several things at once. He was filled with joy that Sam had kept a piece of him so close, grateful that he had back one of his most precious possessions, sure it'd been lost during the attack when he'd come back and found he didn't have it on him, guilty because it was the final piece that put him back as he had been before he'd died and he wasn't all that sure he deserved it.

"Thanks." He couldn't look at Sammy, his eyes burning.

"Don't mention it."

Dean put the amulet on.

Now he was truly back.

"Hey, Dean, what was it like?"

He glanced up at his brother, eyebrows raised, trepidation rearing up as they hit one of the very things he'd so hoped to avoid. "What, Hell?"

He couldn't help but notice Sam's eyes momentarily narrow for a 'yes' as if he were afraid to repeat the question. His gaze was intently glued to him, worry and guilt shinning in his eyes.

It'd been his decision to make the deal, not Sam's. But he knew his brother took it personally. Had probably been driving himself nuts thinking about Dean and what he was going through down under. Well, he wouldn't be the one to give his brother any more Emo fodder. Sam had nothing to do with what happened to him in hell, or with the decisions he had made there.

"I don't know." He couldn't look at him as he voiced out the outright lie, hating the need for it, the cowardice of it, but not having any choice. Yet he had to see if Sam was falling for it, because he _had_ to fall for it. Nothing else would do. "I, ah, must have blacked it out."

Sammy just continued to stare at him, his worry now almost screaming from his eyes, wanting desperately to believe him, needing anything Dean would give him. But he couldn't. He _couldn't_.

"I don't remember a damn thing."

His brother nodded, his hungry, needy gaze leaving him. Dean couldn't tell if Sammy was relieved about his answers or thought he was lying. "Thank God for that."

God had nothing to do with it. "Yeah."

Dean took off his jacket then went on his way, not wanting to take the chance he might give himself away or for Sam to come up with more awkward questions. A lump of shame kept trying to clog his throat as he walked away over lying to his brother so soon after they'd finally been reunited again.

He found the bathroom and closed the door then flipped on the light switch set to the right of the sink. The red garish color of the room barely registered as he rubbed a hand down his face and leaned forward to stare at himself in the mirror.

So, Dean, feeling proud of yourself? Reunited with Sam for less than twenty minutes and already there were lies and secrets stacking between them again. Was this really how he wanted things to go down?

Screams filled his head. Panic and fear his blood. Black obsidian walls rose in his mind's eye and misery so thick he could almost touch it. The blood of those he'd tortured covered him from head to toe. All just so he could save himself from pain. How could he tell that to Sammy? How could he admit to his brother the loathing he felt for himself, or of the fact he'd lost part of his humanity down there? How could he ever look him in the eye again if he ever did tell him? To see the disgust, the horror, but worse, the _pity_, at what had happened to him, of what he'd allowed himself to become. And then watching Sam add the baggage to his own shoulders, as if he had ever had anything to do with what went down.

No. No, he couldn't let that happen. He couldn't…

He jumped at the knock on the door.

It was Bobby. "Hey, I got a hold of her. She'll meet with us as soon as we can get there."

"O-okay." It was a struggle to keep his voice steady. He was wound way too tight. "Be right out."

Dean avoided the mirror and took care of his business, making sure his game face was on before he went back out.

Sam and Bobby were already by the door with their coats on waiting for him. He was glad to note that though his brother's outer shirts had gone a little frou-frou, his dark green coat had not. Sam held out Dean's own brown coat, a droopy smile flickering on his face for a moment, almost as if he knew what Dean was thinking.

The three of them made their way outside, Dean feeling Sam's presence behind him, shining brighter than the Astoria's neon sign, and damn glad to have it there. No matter what else was hosed up about all this, at least they were together again.

Following the sidewalk to the side of the building, they took some white wooden stairs down to the parking lot.

"She's about four hours down the interstate." Bobby pulled out his car keys. "Try to keep up." He headed off toward his SS.

Dean tried to hide a smile, gratitude flooding through him toward his friend for giving him and Sam a chance to spend some time alone together. Not that the old man would ever admit that's what he was doing.

"I assume you'll want to drive?" Sam dug the keys out of his jacket pocket and tossed them to him.

Dean caught them, barely looking his way, his gaze searching eagerly ahead, his brother's words reminding him of the last missing member of their merry band. "Oh ho ho ho. I almost forgot."

A smile tugged at his lips, pleasure rising inside him as he walked up to the only woman who'd ever truly understood him. "Hey, sweetheart. You miss me?"

Her beautiful lines, her shinny coat – she looked as fit and gorgeous as ever. The unique groan as he opened the door was heaven to his ears. He slipped inside her and it was like coming home. The circle was finally complete.

And that was when he spotted it – something that definitely did not belong with the others and soured his euphoria. A weird plastic holder was protruding from the bottom of the dash, beneath their Pioneer radio, and it was plugged into the cigarette lighter, cradling an IPod.

Sam got into the passenger side, Baby rocking with the motion as she'd done thousands of times, every bit of it feeling totally right except for this alien thing staring at him which was totally wrong.

"What the hell is that?" Dean tried to curve the accusatory tone, but was having a hard time of it. This was _wrong_.

"It's an IPod jack."

"You were supposed to take care of her, not douche her up." He saw Sam trying not to take offense at what he was saying, like he'd not done anything wrong. As if! This was Baby they were talking about. You did not mess with her!

Sam snorted. "Dean, I thought it was my car."

Well you thought _way_ wrong, buddy. Dean left his brother his most prized possession and this is what he did to her? And what did he mean he thought it was his car? Okay, so he'd died and gone to Hell and yeah, Sam hadn't been able to find a way to bring him back, but still! A damn IPod jack?

He stuck the key in the ignition, knowing he was overreacting, that Sammy was right, yet the invasion still hit him in the craw harder than any punch. Baby was family. You just didn't go around making over family.

The engine turned over, the familiar purr sweeping over him, trying to soothe him. But then the music piped up from the plugged IPod – yuppie, fruity, easy listening crap – in _his_ car!

Dean half turned in the seat to stare daggers at his brother wondering just how much had gone on while he wasn't there and how much Sammy might have changed during the last four months. "_Really_?"

Sam just stared back at him with his patented 'I'm totally innocent, I haven't done anything' look that Dean hadn't seen since the kid was fourteen and "accidentally" washed a red sock with Dean's underwear, making all his unmentionables pink. He wanted to wring his stinking neck!

Instead, Dean pulled the cord from the lighter socket, grabbed the IPod and the cradle and then tossed the mess into the back.

Sam had the presence of mind to keep his trap shut.

Maybe his brother wasn't as fully suicidal as he'd thought.

Dean followed Bobby out of the parking lot and soon they were booking at a good clip down I-55.

Silence reigned between them in the dark, but to him at least, the sense of Sam's presence was loud and clear and welcomed. Damn, how he'd missed him. Yet, there were too many mosquitoes still flying about stinging him in the brain with unanswered questions and things that didn't make sense. A couple of hours into the drive, he just couldn't leave it alone anymore.

He spoke his mind as they roared down the road, dark trees hemming both sides. "There's still one thing that's bothering me." He made sure to keep his eyes on the road, not positive how this was going to go over, or what he was about to hear.

"Yeah?" Sam turned to look at him.

"Yeah. The night that I bit it. Or got bit." He laughed a little. Couldn't help himself. It was kind of funny, in a sick, twisted kind of way. "How'd you make it out? I thought Lilith was going to kill you?" He sent a pointed glance in his brother's direction.

"Well…she tried. She couldn't." Sam said this lightly and with little inflection -- almost as if it weren't important. Dean wondered if this was part of the 'real quiet like' Sam Bobby had mentioned before.

"What do you mean she couldn't?" He flashed his attention over to the road then back to Sam again.

His brother just stared out the front window, talking about that horrible time as if it had been just another day. "She fired this like, burning light at me…"

That didn't sound good.

"And…," his brother hesitated, "it didn't leave a scratch."

Their gazes crossed. Dean felt the ugly punch line coming.

"Like I was immune or something."

Lumps of rocks started raining down all over Dean's stomach. "Immune?"

"Yeah." Sam gave a half snort. "I don't know who was more surprised…her or me…" He gave a deep sigh. At least he seemed to be showing a little more emotion. "She left pretty fast after that."

Dean stared back out onto the road letting the words band around inside him for a few seconds. "Huh."

Immune or lucky or whatever, his brother had survived, so that was something. It just didn't give him any warm fuzzies. Not a one. It was like Croatoan all over again.

Time to kill another mosquito.

"What about Ruby? Where is she?" He threw a long glance in Sam's direction.

"Dead. Burned out?"

If only they could be so lucky. He licked his lower lip, then bit it, something not feeling right about all this. It was too nice, too neat. It wasn't that he wanted to look a gift horse in the mouth, but his gut insisted that things just weren't adding up. And there was one thing that would explain things. But just the thought of it made him nauseous. "So…you been using your freaky ESP stuff?"

"No." Sam sounded offended.

"You sure about that?" Dean sent him a hard stare. "I mean, now, well, that you've got immunity or whatever the hell that is." A giant sign saying that regardless of what they'd believed when YED died, Sammy's powers hadn't left with him. "Just wondering what other weirdo crap you got going on."

"Nothing, Dean." It was soft, quiet Sam again.

His gut wasn't buying it. It must have shown on his face.

"Look, you didn't want me to go down that road so I didn't go down that road. It was practically your dying wish." The indignation was somewhat lower key than he would have expected, but at least it was there. So was the fact that Sam remembered what they'd talked about that long ago night.

Maybe he was worrying over nothing. Just having some return from the dead jitters or what not. "Yeah, well, let's keep it that way."

After his own taste of the nastiness downstairs, he wanted Sam as far away from those bastards and their temptations as possible. For them to never get their mitts on his soul was one of his missions. His brother would never survive what they'd do to him there. No one could.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Sam turned away from Dean and pretended to sleep. He was tired, numb, but sleep wasn't going to come. Yet it was the easiest way to keep from digging his hole any deeper. By being quiet, he could just feel Dean's presence across from him, feel the car's calming thrum as they drove down the highway. For a moment or two he could pretend things were all right.

But they weren't.

He'd lied. Outright and knowingly lied to his brother. What the hell was wrong with him? Did he really think this wouldn't come back to bite him? But he couldn't deal with it. Not now. Totally not right now.

Why did he keep finding himself in these situations? What was he so afraid of? But he knew, he knew what he was afraid of. He was afraid that now that he had him back, Dean would leave him if he learned the truth. That he'd hate him for his betrayals, his failures. For him taking what Dean thought of as the Dark Path.

He was only too aware of how his powers scared Dean. And how they colored the way his brother looked at him. When YED died, it was almost like he'd never been a freak at all. Sam had thought he might actually be free of all that. He didn't want Dean looking at him with that veiled sense of mistrust, of him not being human, or maybe even his brother. Was that so much to ask for?

He didn't know… He just didn't know. So he'd lied.

Because he was a freak due of the demon blood in him. He was less than human. He'd embraced this, or at least given in to it. He had powers and so he should use them, utilize them if they could make a difference -- stop others from being used or having their lives ruined by demons. But Dean would never understand. He'd already made up his mind about all this. He would never listen.

And he knew with the first set of lies, more would be on the way. He couldn't stop his work. He had to get rid of the demons, make penance, get vengeance. If Dean truly didn't remember anything from his time in Hell then they were blessed and he thanked whoever was responsible for it. Dean seemed okay, his old bossy, jokester self. Sam wanted more than anything for him to stay that way. And he would do whatever was necessary to make it so. Even if he had to hunt down every last demon in Hell and destroy them. _Every last one_.

But why had he brought up the fact of Dean's dying wish? That he couldn't answer. It would make things a whole lot uglier later – of that he had no doubt. But that 'look'…Dean had given him that 'look' as he was asking. And while Sam could stand almost anyone else anymore thinking him whatever they wanted, it wasn't something he could take from his brother.

"Hey, wake up, I think we're there."

Sam stretched, going through the motions, his bones and muscles popping he was coiled so tight. Out the window on his side, he spotted the perfection of suburbia. Comfortable, established homes, well taken care of lawns, a park with trees and swings for the kids, birds singing happily away -- a foreign land to people like him, yet nestled within it was Bobby's psychic. All sorts of things could hide under the guise of normal sometimes…even him.

Bobby said the psychic was good, but despite their need for answers, Sam hoped she wasn't too good. The only other powerful psychic he'd ever met had been Missouri and she'd been damn scary in what she could pick up. Back then it had been humorous, especially as she picked on Dean, but he had things he was hiding now, even more than he had back then. He was running a big risk by coming here. But if they got to learn anything, it might be worth it. Someone else had done what Sam couldn't and the sooner they learned who'd brought Dean back and why, the sooner they could stop whatever it was they had planned for him.

And he did have a trick or two up his sleeve.

He put on a pleasant outer mask and taking a deep breath quieted his thoughts. He got out of the car and glanced over the roof of it across the street taking in the forest green and cream two storied house with a wide covered porch. The early morning sun was glinting off the windows, the one beside the door a pleasant stained glass composition.

He and Dean followed behind Bobby as the latter walked up the steps to the door and knocked on the glass of the dark green front door.

A woman with dark curling shoulder length hair opened it, smiled warmly and then laughed with pleasure as she saw who was there. To Sam's surprise, she grabbed their old friend low in the back, squeezed him hard, and lifted him off the ground for a second, as if she just couldn't contain her delight at seeing Bobby again.

Sam caught Dean's raised brow look which he threw in his direction, also surprised by the emphatic greeting. Sam sent him one back feeling exactly the same.

"You're a sight for sore eyes." Bobby stepped back a little, a slightly embarrassed smile in his voice and face.

The woman stood with arms crossed over a sleeveless dark tee, giving the brother's a quick look up and down. "So, are these the boys?"

It occurred to Sam to wonder just how much Bobby had told her about them.

"Sam, Dean…Pamela Barnes. Best damn psychic in the state." The note of admiration in his voice was rare for Bobby. It was obvious he thought a lot about her, making Sam doubly eager to keep his thoughts focused and his secrets deep.

Not that being distracted was proving to be difficult with her around. It was odd watching her scrape another look up and down Dean. It was one he'd seen his brother use on women way too many times in way too many bars.

"Hey."

Sam noticed Dean trying to be casual about it, but he could tell he wasn't used to such an intense scrutiny. He made himself follow along as well. "Hi."

Approval noises rang from Pamela's smiling mouth as she looked from them to Bobby. Bobby's answering widened eyed look seemed to be saying for her to watch it. And he didn't seem a bit surprised at her hungry attitude either. Sam wondered what their friend might have neglected to tell them about 'the best psychic in the state'.

Pamela appeared amused at Bobby's silent admonition as she turned her attentions back on his brother again. "Dean Winchester, out of the fire and back into the frying pan, huh?"

Sam felt a moment of trepidation wondering if she'd sensed this or if Bobby had told her. He shoved it all aside and again struggled to keep his mind blank.

"Makes you a rare individual." She made it sound like he was a rare type of candy she couldn't wait to lick.

"If you say so."

Her expression suddenly grew hard to read. Dean's close shyness if not embarrassment at her statement was surprising too. It wasn't as if they all didn't _know_ Dean's return wasn't in every way a very rare occurrence.

"Come on in." Pamela stepped back so they could move past her into the house. She laughed and patted Bobby on the arm as he went past.

Sam let Dean go in before him, trying to keep himself as much in the background as possible.

"So, did you hear anything?" Bobby asked.

Sam sidled past the psychic and she turned to close the door behind them.

She sighed. "Well, I ouijied my way through a dozen spirits." She turned to face them, her black painted nails gleaming as she crossed her arms again. "No one seems to know who broke your boy out or why."

Bobby nodded. "So what's next?"

"Ah, a séance I think." She glanced at Sam and Dean. "See if we can see who did the deed."

He figured that sounded as good as anything else.

Bobby had a different opinion. "You're…not gonna summon the damn thing here..?"

This made Sam wonder about Bobby's own theories on what might have done it. His cautious tone definitely implied he didn't think it was anything good.

Pamela laughed. "No. I just want to get a sneak peek at it. Like a crystal ball without the crystal." She poked Bobby in the stomach as she sauntered past.

Dean threw in his two cents. "I'm game."

Bobby still didn't look convinced, sighing heavily behind them.

Pamela led them to a large room toward the back of the house. A round table adorned in a dark red table cloth dominated the center. It matched the fabric of the sofa nestled by the windows and the chairs set around it. Bobby walked to the windows to draw the heavy red drapes, cutting off the view from the outside. Pamela spread out a black cloth over the table, one with a stylized pentacle surrounded by a five sided pentagram with other symbols etched onto it. These drew his interest immediately having seen many of these symbols before, but never together – an Egyptian eye, the Greek Omega for Great or End. He was still trying to place the two overlapping four sided stars and how these all met and in what context when Dean elbowed him on the arm to get his attention.

Looking up, Sam followed his brother's stare to the psychic who was currently squatting in front of an open black cabinet filled with different colored candles. Her tank top had ridden up a little over her attractive back and a tattoo was visible just above the rim of her jeans. It said ~ Jesse Forever~.

"Who's Jesse?" Dean asked.

Pamela laughed and glanced back at his brother, candles held in both hands. "Well, it wasn't forever."

Sam wasn't really surprised. Freaks, no matter how pretty the package, always had a hard time keeping normals. He wondered if she'd manifested after they'd committed to one another and her new found skills had soured the relationship.

"His loss." Dean laughed.

Sam could tell Pamela was flattered. He could very well imagine the type of images she might be picking up from his brother's brain right now. Had he learned nothing of his experience with Missouri?

To his surprise, however, she responded with another hungry look. "Might be your gain."

Dean turned to look at him as she walked away, also looking astonished. Sam couldn't help but be amused. His brother might have just met his female equivalent. Not that that seemed to slow him down any.

"Dude, I am so _in_."

Sam was forced to almost bite his tongue as he pressed it against his cheek to keep from laughing. "Yeah, she's going to eat you alive."

"Hey, I just got out of jail." His eyes glittered. "Bring it on!"

The eager, challenging look on Dean's face almost made Sam lose it.

Pamela swung back by. "You're invited too, grumpy." She winked at Sam. Oh holy spit! She was _worse_ than his brother.

Dean turned on him, the lecture finger raised to high alert. "You're not invited!"

Sam felt something loosen inside him, something he'd not known was twisted so tight it'd been ready to snap. This was the Dean he loved. The carefree Dean he knew. Again he felt a happy twinge deep down telling him his brother had truly returned to him. Dean was back!

"A couple of ground rules before we get this going, guys." All of their attentions riveted to Pamela as she sauntered to another cabinet to take out a large black candle holder. "When we do this thing, I'll need you to keep your minds blank and your eyes closed. Don't break the circle no matter what happens. Just think of the usual mumbo jumbo in all the old horror flicks. Not everything on TV is a lie."

Smiling as she left them with that little tidbit, Pamela set six thick white candles into the black holder which she then set inside the central star on the table cloth. She indicated for Bobby to sit at the head of the pentacle. Sam and Dean sat at the bottom and she settled herself between Dean and Bobby.

After a moment, the psychic closed her eyes and touched her forehead with her right middle finger and her chest as if focusing on points of power. Sam felt his skin prickle, truly hoping this would not be a wild goose chase. A rock star in a wild pose, in a large black and white framed picture, stared down at the proceedings -- not exactly conforming to the usual movie clichés for a séance. But then again, Pamela seemed anything but cliché.

"Right…" The psychic brought her hands down. "Take each other's hands."

Bobby's were already on the table, a look of resignation on his face. Sam didn't totally understand the attitude since it had been Bobby's idea for them to come here in the first place. He placed his hands on top of the table as well, grabbing one of Bobby's and Dean's as they brought their hands near his. Despite all their previous experiences with the supernatural, this would be a first for at least two of them.

"And I need to touch something our mystery monster touched." Pamela's right hand went under the table.

Dean's knee banged up suddenly against the wood, making a resounding sound. "Whoa! Well, he didn't touch me there."

Pamela laughed, obviously not sorry in the least despite what she said next. "My mistake."

Sam stared at them, embarrassment trying to creep up on him, which should have been the farthest feeling he should have had during a séance, amazed there truly was someone out there even more brazen and opportunistic than Dean. Yeah, the psychic would eat his brother up and spit him back out and then some.

He saw Dean send him a look and assumed it had to do with his own changing feelings on subject. Sam turned and sent a bemused look in Bobby's direction knowing it would get Dean's goat. But he'd assumed wrong.

Dean cleared his throat and then removed the outer shirt over his olive t-shirt on the left side. As Sam wondered what he was doing, he winced inside as he noticed the angry wounds over Dean's knuckles from when he'd had to dig his way out of his own grave. A horrid experience Sam wished he could have saved him. Any thoughts on the subject, however, went out the window as his brother pulled up on the sleeve of the t-shirt and revealed burned and swollen skin that formed the shape of a hand on his shoulder.

Sam grimaced at the sight of it, both in revulsion and sympathy, none of them having mentioned the thing to him before. He threw a glance in Pamela's direction then one at Bobby and saw no surprise in either face, even as Pamela put her own hand over the ugly thing. Bobby's gaze met his, telling Sam he knew not what exactly.

He found his attention inexorably drawn back to the swollen flesh on his brother's arm. Somehow it being there spiked home the fact they knew not a damn thing about who or what or how Dean had been brought back and why. The wound was like a brand. As if his brother were now someone else's property. Sam didn't like it.

Dean took his hand again, though at the moment, Sam barely felt it. He placed his left over Bobby's, who had already taken Pamela's. This formed the circle with Pamela connected to it through Dean's burn and Bobby's hand.

Sam stared at his brother, his chest tight, feelings battling inside him, Dean's poignant gaze not relieving any of them in the least. No wonder his brother had gone postal back at the hotel. Who wouldn't freak out with a mark like that on their shoulder? He would have probably been relieved if it had been Sam who'd brought him back regardless of what he would have had to pay for it and what trouble Dean would have to go to get him out of it.

His brother looked away as if he knew what he was thinking.

Pamela's eyes were closed as she started to chant. "I invoke, conjure, and command you – appear unto me before this circle."

Sam closed his own eyes, remembering her earlier instructions and trying to clear out his mind of all thought despite the shock of only moments ago.

Pamela repeated her chant but with a little more force as if pushing against something.

As she finished the words for the second time, a TV came on somewhere behind them and to her left. Sam made sure to keep his eyes closed despite the temptation to look. Pamela continued on as if it meant nothing and chanted the words again. He felt something brush his cheek then the table began to quiver beneath his resting arms. A thin shrill sound filled the air.

He heard Pamela hesitate.

"Castiel? No, sorry, Castiel, I don't scare easy."

"Castiel?" This came from Dean.

"Its name. It's whispering, warning me to turn back."

They had a name! The name of something powerful enough to have dragged his brother from the pit. And it was warning her? Warning her against what? Sam was tempted to open his eyes again, to share a glance with his brother, but instead clamped down on his thoughts to still his mind and kept his eyes shut.

Pamela started her chant for the fourth time.

Sam suddenly knew something wasn't right. That odd sense he felt at times when things were about to go fubar tapping him on the shoulder. Would a demon give a warning? It wasn't like them. They'd assumed it was a demon that dragged Dean out of the pit, but if not a demon, then what? The image of the burn on Dean's shoulder sent an unwanted shiver down his spine. He struggled to keep his mind clear.

The table's rocking grew more pronounced as Pamela's chant of commands upon what had branded Dean grew more insistent. Sam's feelings of wrongness escalated. He opened his eyes not able to hold back anymore, sure that things were about to take an ugly turn. He could see the heavy table rocking back and forth, the candle flames flickering from a non-existent breeze.

Bobby's eyes were also open, though Dean and Pamela's were still closed. Her grip on Dean's arm was tight as a steel clamp. Bobby didn't look any more confident about the direction things were going than he did. And he said so. "Maybe we should stop."

"I almost got it." Pamela sounded confident, as if all the weirdness around them was common place. To her maybe it was.

Dean opened his eyes and Sam saw that he too was having second thoughts about this path. Pamela's commands rang out again.

Suddenly, the flame of the six candles shot up several feet into the air, washing them with the scent of melting wax and a wave of unexpected heat.

Pamela shrieked and even through the column of fire Sam saw her eyes momentarily glow brighter than the candles themselves then erupt with flames as if being consumed from within. Her piercing scream died moments later only to continue echoing in his head. The stench of burned flesh rose around them as her eyelids closed, blood running from beneath them, and she collapsed, falling to the floor.

The blaze from the candles fell back to normal levels.

Sam felt as if all the air had been pulled from his lungs. He sat there staring, his brain refusing to process what they'd just witnessed.

"Call 9-1-1!"

Bobby's desperate command cut through the numbness in his brain and Sam rocketed out of his chair, having to forcibly yank his gaze away from the fallen psychic. Stumbling towards the front of the house, he found a phone and dialed. As the horrible image replayed itself over and over in his mind, some part of him recalled that using the house phone would automatically give emergency services the address, one he could not have supplied if asked.

The following phone conversation was a blur, something done on autopilot. When they disconnected, he hung up the phone and with dread and a gut wrenching dose of fear, he made his way back into the main room.

Dean and Bobby had moved Pamela over to the couch. A folded towel was over the upper part of her face, though he didn't know if it was to catch any leaking fluids or to hide the travesty of her desiccated eyes. Both men looked pale, and though Pamela was still thankfully unconscious, Bobby was next to her, holding her hand, whispering by her ear.

Dean stood off to the side, leaning against the wall as if not quite trusting that he would be able to stay upright on his own.

"They're on their way." Sam barely recognized his own voice, sounding as if it came from a long way away.

His brother glanced in his direction, a mesh of clashing emotions rushing across his face, before he quickly looked away again. Sam could almost hear the slam as his brother pushed them back into the darkness. Yet the brief flash had been more than enough. Sam had read them all. It had been easy – because he was already well acquainted with them himself – horror, grief, guilt.

What had happened to Pamela was their doing. Yet another debt to be written onto the roster, yet another they would probably never be able to rectify or pay. But these paled versus something much much worse. This thing, this Castiel, had the power to rip men from the grasp of Hell, but also to reach out and burn out the eyes of the living. What possible need could it have for Dean? Why had it freed him? And what more would they and those associated with them be made to pay because of it…


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11

The drive back to Pontiac was long and silent. Dean drove, barely seeing the road, still in shock from the events of that morning.

Madness. Ever since he'd come back it had been nothing but madness. Things were only growing more complicated by the minute rather than making any sense or staying put. You'd think after a lifetime of dealing with the paranormal there would be little that could faze then, but somebody out there thought different. Sooner or later the other shoe he'd been expecting would drop, and he was damn sure it wouldn't be pretty.

Not that Pamela would have to worry on that account. She'd already gotten her sandal, the boot, the whole freaking shoe store dropped on her.

The psychic had been overconfident and paid the price. But confidence was something you had to have or fake in this business or you'd never get anywhere. It wasn't safe, everyone knew that. But not in his wildest nightmares had he expected what she got. If he'd even suspected, he would have never gone anywhere near her. Yet another casualty of the Winchesters.

Dean's grip tightened on the steering wheel until he couldn't feel his fingers anymore.

He felt like a coward for leaving. But Bobby had been right, there was nothing they could do for Pamela now. And by going they might even be protecting her, taking whatever attacked her with them, since Dean was this Castiel's pet project, not her. The mother had burned out her eyes! _Her freakin' eyes_! What kind of monster could do such a thing?

Sooner or later someone would pay for that. He would make sure. It was the least he owed her. He'd learned a few ugly techniques he would definitely try on him, it, whatever, if he got the chance. He'd be sorry.

Dean turned into the Astoria's parking lot and shut down the engine, but made no move to get out of the car. Going inside and being trapped by four walls as they waited for news was not something he wanted. But what else could they do?

He didn't say anything as Sam seemed to come to life beside him, wrapped in his own world as Dean had been in his on the way back.

"I don't think I want to go upstairs."

Dean threw a glance at him, noticing the tight jaw, the roaming gaze. Sammy was as wound up as he was, and less than satisfied by events. "Then let's go walking." He took the keys out of the ignition. "You know of any decent joints around here? It'd be nice to have some pie. Been a long time since I had me some _pie_."

He didn't really want it, the circumstances not calling for any type of pleasure, but it would be doing something. Sam nodded as if he understood the thoughts behind the request. Dean wouldn't have been surprised.

"I think there's a diner a couple of blocks back. We could try there."

"Awesome!" Dean got out of the car horribly glad to be moving.

Sam led the way off to the right. The sun was bright, a soft breeze swaying the tall trees which lined the streets. Real life could seem so surreal at times and the last few days it had been doing it in spades. It was so hard to believe in settings like these people got hurt, died, mutilated each other, let alone that undeserving souls could be yanked out of Hell and given another chance.

In a place like this it would be easy to fool yourself into thinking the last forty years had never happened. Just a nightmare to be forgotten. But Dean knew better. He'd seen parts of himself he never wanted to face again. They bobbed just beneath the surface, waiting for any excuse to come up for air. If thrust back into the pit again, he had no illusions as to what he would do once he got down there.

Though the air was cool, Dean could feel perspiration pooling at his brow and back. Fear gnawed at his gut, a constant companion for about a day now and not looking to leave anytime soon. It was made all the worse by the fact he had so much to lose again. He surreptitiously glanced at his brother out of the corner of his eye.

"That's the place. Look okay?" Sam pointed across the street to a brick building with lots of glass. A big white sign with red lettering proclaimed the place as Johny Mac's. Red door, red wide stripes on the glass, covered with white blinds. Home style cooking seven days a week. He'd often wondered if home style cooking was truly anything like home. One of the many things he and Sammy knew nothing about. But it sounded friendly.

"Sure." Glancing both ways down the street, they went on across.

Inside, the diner looked like a thousand other places they'd been in. Sometimes he could swear they all bought the furniture from the same company regardless of what state they were in. Typical booths graced the right wall, the rest of the space filled with small square metal tables with white tops. Metal chairs with brownish red coverings finished off the ensemble. Guess that while they did home style cooking, they didn't go much for looking like home. The typical lunch counter with an open grill setup behind it took up the back. Dean grabbed a table near there, making sure to sit himself facing the door.

"Order me a slice of whatever. I need to make a pit stop." Sam tipped his head in the direction of the restrooms off to the right. "Also, I want to call Bobby and get an update."

Dean nodded and watched him go, the sight of his brother still feeling like a mirage at times. He was sure if this was some cruel game of Alastair's, he would have shown his hand already. The demon was patient when it came to the art of carving and torture, but not about much else.

"Hi! Welcome to Johny Mack's. Would you like to order?"

Dean glanced up at the waitress who sprouted up beside him out of nowhere. Green tank top and jeans, the typical off color apron with pockets, thirty something with brown hair, and not a bad looker. He could have done a lot worse and knew it. He just wished he actually felt like taking advantage of it. Oh well.

"What pies you serving today?"

She gave him a friendly grin. "Peach, apple, and cherry. All out of chocolate."

His stomach actually grumbled in expectation. Guess there were some functions you just couldn't keep down. "Two slices of cherry, if you would."

She wrote the order down. "Be up in a jiff."

He spotted Sam coming out from the back, cell phone glued to his ear. "Yeah, you bet." He ended the call and put the phone away as he made to sit down.

Dean dreaded asking, but needed to get this over with. "What Bobby say?"

"Uh, Pam's stable and out of ICU."

"And blind because of us." Might as well lay the ugly truth out on the table. It was good she would live, but her life had been changed by them forever, and not for the better.

"_And_ we still have no clue what we're dealing with." His brother's displeasure at the state of things radiated off him in droves.

It made Dean suddenly realize that despite everything, they weren't quite as in the dark as before. "That's not entirely true."

Sammy gave him a doubtful look. "No?"

"We got a name – Castiel or whatever." Dean leaned forward over the table. "With the right mumbo jumbo we can summon him and bring him right to us." And get some much needed answers and payback.

"You're crazy!" Sam's patented expression of disapproval was making an appearance. "Absolutely not."

"We'll work him over. I mean after what he did?" Didn't Sam think the guy deserved it? This needed to be nipped in the bud – _now_.

Sam's stare burned into him. "Pam took a peek at him and her eyes burned out of her skull and you want a face to face?"

"You got a better idea?" As if.

Sam sat back in his chair. "Yeah, as a matter of fact I do."

Dean wasn't sure he liked the snooty, know it all tone. Guess there were something he might not have missed after all.

"I followed some demons to town, right?"

He had no choice but to give his brother that one. "Okay."

"So, we go find them." Sam's little sing song tone had to go. "Someone's gotta know something about something."

The waitress chose that moment to show back up and put a piece of sweet smelling cherry pie in front of Dean then a second in front of Sam. "Thanks."

Dean grabbed his plate and brought it closer before reaching for his fork. Out of the corner of his eye though, he noticed that the waitress didn't leave, but instead pulled out the empty chair facing them and sat down. He gave her a stare, noticing her laid back expectant stance. He couldn't help but throw a questioning look in his brother's direction to see if he had a clue as to what the heck was going on. He could tell Sam had nothing.

Half amused and half irritated, Dean put his fork back down, not sure what this was about. Not your usual waitress behavior, that's for sure. He tried giving her a disarming, cocked smile, mentally tallying the weapons he had on him at the moment, just in case. He knew he was a catch, and anyone would be lucky to take him, but he'd not given out any signals earlier and not seen any from her either. Something was up. "You angling for a tip?"

She gave him an amused smile back. "I'm sorry, I thought you were looking for us."

Dean's heart gave a lurch as her eyes clouded over in black. All curiosity and amusement about the situation dried up and went. They had finally come for him. He watched her as she continued to look amused and glanced at his brother. That just made him feel ten times worse. No way was he going back and no way was anyone taking his brother down there either.

Out of the corner of his eye, Dean noticed a mechanic in a dark green suit and matching cap with the name badge of Roger as well as the fry cook behind him flashing their dark eyes to show who they were. The mechanic got off the stool and moseyed on over to the front door and locked it with a theatrical twist of his wrist. There were only five of them currently in the place at the moment, and three of them were possessed by demons. The only bright side was that whatever went down, he and Sam wouldn't have to worry about extra civilians getting in the line of fire.

Dean traded looks with him, his brother as keyed up and aware of the shit they were in as he was.

The waitress allowed her eyes to return to normal and stared at him with the soft smile still parked on her lips. "Dean…To Hell and back." She oozed with pleasantness. "Aren't you a lucky duck."

Someone really needed to work on her witty dialogue. What was she, three? He gave her an unfelt half smile. "That's me."

"So, you get to just stroll out of the pit, huh?"

His heart lurched again but this time for different reasons. That was just an odd thing to hear from a demon. What came out of her mouth next was even more so.

"What makes you so special?"

Dean's mouth couldn't let that pass. "I'd like to think it's because of my perky nipples." That sounded like a fine damn reason to him too, if he said so himself. He stared at the waitress waiting to see her reaction.

She didn't give him one. She just waited patiently as if having all the time in the world for his real response.

This was getting too weird. He and Sam were supposed to be out there getting answers not being the ones demons came to get them from. Time to change tactics. "I don't know. Wasn't my doing and I don't know who pulled me out."

"Right…you don't." Her lack of belief was way beyond obvious.

Coming from a demon, it irritated the crap out of him. "No. I don't."

"Lying's a sin you know."

This conversation was bizarre on so many levels. Being called a liar by a master of lies was a new treat. And it also told him a few things. "I'm not lying."

He noticed the demon's attention flicker to his brother as if wanting to verify what he'd just told her somehow. Though he didn't take his own attentions off her for a second, he could feel the coiled antagonism radiating toward her from Sammy. He wanted his brother left out of this.

"But I'd like to find out, so if you wouldn't mind enlightening me, _Flo_." He was rather surprised and pleased that his innocuous old, used up waitress reference scored a hit. All traces of amusement were now gone from the demon's stolen face.

"Mind your tongue with me, boy. Or I'll drag you back to Hell myself."

Dean felt Sam shift at the threat, waves of approaching violence shooting from him. It both thrilled and confused him, this not being typical Sam. He held up his hand, hoping his brother would see it and take note, not daring to take his eyes off her. Something wasn't right here. He'd spent way too many years around her arrogant kind not to sense it.

Only when she allowed her focus to slip toward Sam as his brother held back, did Dean dare shoot a glimpse in his direction. His brother was a cocked weapon, ready to bodily throw himself at the demon on his say so. He even shot Dean a glance asking for a go.

And that's when it hit him. That's when he understood what was odd about all this. The demon's attention slipped back to him. "No. You won't."

"No?" She tried for an amused look again but this time it fell short.

"No. Cause if you were, you'd have done it already." The answering look on her face confirmed it. He decided to go a bit further. "Fact is, you don't know who cut me loose. You're just as spooked as we are." He could tell he had her. "You're looking for answers."

He saw her glance at Sam again and had another epiphany. This bunch thought it was _his brother_ who brought him back! Sam had survived being face to face with Lilith after all. He had been chosen by Azazel as his protégé, before his untimely and well deserved demise – so surely he had to have great power. But they were wrong. "Well, maybe it was some supercharged spirit, hm? Or, ah, Godzilla. Or some big bad boss demon. But I'm guessing at your pay grade they don't tell you squat."

Each word out of his mouth made her look more and more uncomfortable and only added fuel to the fire. "Cause whoever it was," and he realized as he said it how true it was, "they want me out. And they're a lot stronger than you."

He could almost feel her quivering in her loafers.

"So go ahead," he said, "send me back. But don't come crawling to me when they show up on your front doorstep with some Vaseline and a fire hose." Though he would pay money to actually see that.

"I'm going to reach down your throat and rip out your lungs." If looks could kill, he'd have been dead. Too bad for her it didn't work that way.

He had her now and she knew it. Staring dead into her face, he leaned forward as if to make the task easier for her. She didn't move. He'd never seen a demon so scared out of its mind before. It warmed places in his heart he hadn't known he had.

Humans would be the ones doing the pushing today.

Still staring her full in the face, Dean reached out and slapped her – hard. His hand stung from the blow even as the sound of it echoed in the enclosed space.

The demon didn't fall off the chair though it was a close thing. Yet rather than get angry or attack him, she just turned her face back toward him once more. So he hit her again.

He felt and heard the shocked surprise from Sammy's direction though Dean never looked his way.

As the demon straightened up a second time, he noticed her gaze flicker to his brother again. She truly thought he'd been the one. "Yeah, that's what I thought."

Again she glanced at his brother then back at him.

"Let's go, Sam." Dean waited for him to get up then followed suit, still keeping his full concentration on the demonically possessed waitress.

As he'd thought before, a lot of their job had to do with confidence. And he had to ooze it now for all their sakes. He stopped beside her as she continued to cower in her chair, fear and false bravado fighting for dominance. He reached into his jacket pocket for his money clip.

Peeling a five from the top, he dropped it on the table. "For the _pie_."

Should have ordered it to go.

Dean made sure Sam was out the door before he took his leave as well. His brother started across the street and he made sure to be right behind him. "Holy crap that was close!"

There was no motion behind them whatsoever. They'd miraculously gotten away. Shouldn't have been possible. The demons had had them dead to rights.

"We're not just going to leave them in there are we, Dean?"

"Yeah." Like Duh. "There's three of them and probably more and we've only got one knife between us."

"Well, I've killed a lot more demons than that lately."

Just hearing Sam say it gave Dean chills. His brother out there alone -- _killing_ demons. "Not anymore. The smarter brother's back in town." Sam would stay safe and _alive_ for a long long time if he had anything to say about it. He kept their pace lively along the sidewalk.

"Dean, we gotta take 'em. They're dangerous."

"They're scared. Okay?" Didn't Sam see how insane it would be to go after them right now? How bad someone had to be to frighten that bunch shitless? And Sammy and him were the ones who had to deal with the thing! "Scared of whatever had the juice to yank me out. We're dealing with a bad mofo here – one job at a time."

He just hoped they'd be able to deal with it. This just looked stickier and stickier all the time.


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Sam understood his brother's reticence against going after the demons in the diner, but it was misplaced. Dean didn't have all the facts. Yet that was Sam's own fault and he knew it. Arguing further with Dean would only get questions asked he didn't want. Things needed taking care of however. And taking care of them, he would.

The two of them went back to the Astoria, deciding that staying out of sight for the moment would be the wiser course. Sam struggled to keep moving and acting normal, though at the moment he felt anything but. They swung by the parking lot and retrieved several books out of the Impala's trunk, hoping to stumble over some piece of knowledge that might help them. Dean had never been one for standing by idle. Though books and research were Sam's elements, his brother would rather lower himself to that and pitch in than sit around and do nothing.

Keeping Dean occupied worked for Sam as well -- less time for his brother to think of questions or create the need for more lies. He was both thrilled and horrified that his brother was back. Sam had been given a second chance by someone, somehow, and he planned not to waste it. Watching over Dean and keeping him out of harm's way as much as possible would be his top priorities.

All he needed was to figure out exactly how to go about it without getting caught.

"I'm gonna be a while. Get started without me." Sam nodded in the direction of the bathroom then toward the books piled on the coffee table.

Dean grimaced at the books, but nodded. "You didn't have a burrito today, right? I might have to go in there later."

Sam gave his brother the expected eye roll, though he felt like anything but. Dean gave him back a tired smile and reached for a couple of the books on the top.

Sam went into the open bathroom then locked the door behind him. His hands shook as he reached to turn on the sink. The set mask slipped from his face as he glanced into the mirror. Fear shone there, deep, terrified fear – for his brother, but most of all for himself. Today had been a close thing. After all the shocks dumped on them, the horror with Pamela, and then to be caught unawares by the very demons he'd been looking for.

The moment he realized who they were, he'd been ready for nothing but violence, to kill the demons and hopefully rescue the hosts. Only Dean's presence had made him hesitate and it'd been the most tenuous of holds. He didn't want his secret revealed, but neither would he make Dean pay to hold onto it. And no way in Heaven or Hell was he going to let them even try to take his brother back to the pit.

He cupped his still not entirely steady hands beneath the semi-warm water knowing part of that was the fact he was coming down from the adrenaline high. The rest of it…

He'd lost Dean once and it had almost destroyed him. He'd only survived despite himself not because he was strong or rallied or any of those things. And now Dean was back, they had more mysteries than they could handle, demons all over the place, and way too many opportunities for Sam to possibly lose his brother again.

He brought his face down into the cupped water and gasped as it touched his skin. All his senses seemed primed into hypersensitivity. The red walls glared at him. The air felt too close. The water too wet. His heart hammered in his chest as if wanting to leave him.

He didn't know if he could do it. He didn't know if he could be close with Dean again, allow him that far in, and live with the constant terror that he might lose him again. Before, it was a risk they took, something possible but never certain. Yet it had happened! Not only had Dean died over and over on that awful Tuesday, but then Lilith murdered him when his time was up. At least during the Trickster's awful joke there had been hope of finding him and forcing him to bring his brother back. When Dean got taken to Hell, though, every possibility had been closed to him. He'd had no one to turn to, no hope of ever getting his brother back.

He grabbed a towel off the rack and wiped at his face, feeling it rake over him like sandpaper.

And though miraculously his brother had gotten a fourth chance at life, Sam knew nothing about how it had happened. So he couldn't make it happen again, so Dean would not likely get a fifth shot if anything went wrong. He just didn't know if he could stand going through that again. It hurt even trying to think about it.

There were no guarantees Ruby could bring him back to his senses a second time. And it'd been a very close thing the first time around.

His head snapped up, eyes wide, the towel dropping from his hands.

Ruby… He'd forgotten all about Ruby…

Sam left the sink running, then fished for his cell as he moved as far back into the room as possible. He hit six on speed dial.

The call picked up on the first ring.

"About time." The familiar female voice didn't sound the least bit amused and if anything rather angry.

Sam grimaced, sure he deserved that and more.

"Sorry. Things haven't been exactly calm around here." He sent a glance toward the closed door, Dean but a few feet away beyond it, and kept his voice low. "We've been busy."

A heavy silence reigned for a moment on the other end.

"How's the long lost brother reunion going? Had many heart to hearts?" Her seemingly pleasant tone told him she was feeling anything but. "Have you let Dean know I'm here, yet?"

Sam felt his brows draw together. It had been the farthest thing from his mind. "No. You know I haven't. I need to work up to that." And he would. Wouldn't he? Though the mere thought of bringing her name up to his brother made his stomach clench. He was only too clear on how Dean felt about Ruby. He wasn't looking forward to that conversation. "Look, I only have a minute. So could we not do this now? Please?"

An impatient snort was her only comment.

"I found them. The demons we were looking for. They're holed up in a diner only a few blocks from the hotel."

"Oh!" Her voice brightened considerably. "That's good. That's very good. Did you take them out?"

Sam moved the hair away from his face, leaning back against the wall as he considered how best to answer her question. He stared at the white toilet as the room's dripping red walls drilled into his brain, trying their damndest to give him a headache. "No, not yet. But I will. Tonight. I just have to wait for Dean to fall asleep."

"So you haven't told him about _that_ either…"

Sam closed his eyes for a moment feeling guilt and irritation all at once. "No. The time hasn't been right. A lot's been going on."

"I'm _sure_." Ruby had never been one to pass up giving him a hard time, but after all the trouble she went to for him when Dean first showed up not to give them away, this reversal on her part seemed a little out of whack. But then she wasn't one used to just being ditched and ignored.

"_Ruby_…"

"Fine, fine. He's your brother, not mine." Background noises faded in and out as if she were pacing. "Text me the location or name and I'll meet you there later."

"Will do." Though he should have said goodbye and hung up the call, he found himself hesitating at cutting the connection. Dean was his brother, and he was beyond ecstatic to have him back, but Ruby knew his secrets, had been there for him when his brother could not. And the way things were currently falling, she was definitely getting the short end of the stick.

"Oh, and Sam?"

"Yeah?" He glanced again at the closed door. He was surprised at how guilty he felt about the subterfuge. Not that he had a choice.

"I took the liberty of going back up there when the bunch of you ditched last night. Got all my stuff out." There was an undercurrent of amusement growing in her voice. "Even the panties you shoved under the couch."

"That was…thanks…" His chest filled with gratitude. He wasn't doing right by her, but she was still helping him. "I'm really sorry about all this."

"You'll be making it up to me, I promise you." She laughed. "And a good start will be you getting rid of those bastards at the diner."

"I will. I haven't forgotten what I'm here for." Sooner or later Lilith would pay for what she'd done to his brother, for what she'd put Sam through. And to do that, he had to get stronger. It didn't bother him one bit to be killing her minions along the way to reach that goal either. Plus he was saving lives. And with Dean back, it was more vital than ever. The demon whore wouldn't be getting her mitts on his brother ever again.

"Good to hear it. See you, Sam."

After she cut off the connection, he quickly sent Ruby the promised text message. He made sure the phone was still set on vibrate, not wanting an errant call or text from her to rouse Dean's suspicions that he hadn't actually been working alone all this time. Pushing away from the wall, he made an effort to pull himself back together. When he felt reasonably stable, he shut off the sink and made his way out.

Dean had discovered the sleeper bed hidden inside the lime green couch and had unfolded it, propping himself up with some pillows and several of the books they'd brought inside with them.

"Find anything yet?" Sam grabbed a book of his own from the stack and settled into the black chair by the corner.

Dean sent him a dirty look. "Yeah, right."

Sam hid a smirk. It was like discovering bits of Dean all over again. Each one a nail pounded by reality into his skull that his brother really, truly was back, and so the more Sam dared believe it. But with that belief also came more trepidation. Dread that he might lose him again, that he would fail him again, that he'd be left alone with that yawning pit again.

Shaking his head, Sam pushed the ugly thoughts away and started skimming the book's pages not really seeing them. As the moments ticked by, he became ever more aware of Dean's presence filling the room, as familiar a sensation as his own skin. It made him ache, wanting more and more of it as if he were a junkie on withdrawal, not having thought he would ever have his fix again.

He glanced up to sneak a peek at his brother, then looked back down at his book, having caught Dean doing the exact same. Guess this was awkward for both of them. But he wouldn't have traded it for the world.

They sat like that in this weird self-conscious shy companionable silence and poured through the books for the next several hours.

Eventually Dean gave out a long drawn out yawn as he scrunched down a little further into the propped pillows. Darkness had descended outside, the Astoria's neon washing in through the window and covering his brother in a blanket of red.

Sam felt his pulse speed up and glanced at the clock. It was almost midnight. They'd been going none stop for over a day and with Dean being only newly back, it looked to be catching up with him just as Sam had hoped. Give his brother some heavy reading for a few hours and the formula was complete. He'd honestly been a little surprised his brother had held out this long. It only showed how truly worried he was about the things they didn't know and the part they played in what had happened to Pamela.

The yawn, however, was a very good sign.

Soon Sam would be able to leave the hotel and do his part to make the world a safer place for Dean.


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13

Dean jerked awake, not having realized he'd fallen asleep. There was a hissing noise from across the room and he rubbed at his eye as he turned to glance in that direction. He felt a frown grow on his face as he saw that the TV was on, showing nothing but snow, and so was the radio.

All trace of sleep left him as his muddled brain recalled another scene but a couple of days old that was just like this. Opening up all his senses for trouble, he tensed, then shoved the open heavy book off his lap before rolling to the other side of the bed. Landing on his feet, he reached down into the folding sleeper sofa's frame and pulled out his sawed off shotgun from where he'd tucked it earlier just in case.

Holding it ready, he allowed his gaze to roam about the room, goose bumps rolling up his back as he sensed a low level shrill, just like he had back at the old gas station. He didn't see anything that shouldn't be there and was actually relieved to note Sam wasn't in the room. With any luck, whatever was going to go down, his brother wouldn't be a part of it.

Still seeing nothing out of the ordinary, Dean held the shotgun ready and stepped toward the room's front door. That sense of an alien presence was back, making the hairs on the back of his neck rise to attention. Something was coming. Hopefully Castiel, so he could then try to get in some well deserved payback on that sucker.

The shrill sound rose in pitch. It felt like a spike was being driven through his ears straight into his brain. His free hand rose to protect one of them, for the little it actually did. A cracking sound made him look up over his shoulder. The whole ceiling was covered in large square mirrors. How the heck had he missed that before? At any other time he would have thought it way way cool, but at the moment, he had a whole slew of other things to worry about.

The shriek increased yet again and made him groan with pain, the spike of agony bouncing and thumping around in his head. He refused to let go of the shotgun, though he wanted nothing more than to cover both his ears and try to make the hurting stop. But dammit if he wasn't going to meet this sucker armed and give him what for.

A moment later, he ended up with little choice, the pain growing so strong, he couldn't see straight. Dean dropped the shotgun and clamped both hands over his ears in a vain attempt to shut the intruding sound out. His knees gave out from under him, his sense of direction hosed suddenly to heck.

The windows took that moment to implode behind him. The concussion of it buffeted him back and forth.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the mirrors above him crack again and realized that if he didn't move he would soon be showered by knives of glass that would make him a human shish kabob. The panel above gave way and he was forced to throw himself to the right to avoid it. The big squares fell one after another in large broken pieces, exploding like grenades all around him. He could feel warmth trickling over his pressed hands and fingers where they were still clamped over his ears but he was in too much pain and about to likely end up dead to care.

Scrunching up into a fetal position, Dean tried to protect as much of himself as he could amidst the sharp barrage unable to do little else.

A change of pressure and waft of air made him look up and over and he spotted Bobby standing in shock at the room's open door. His friend rushed to him, glass crunching underfoot, and grabbed him by the arms to pull him up. He could see Bobby's lips moving, but couldn't hear a thing he was saying.

"Bobby, get Sam! The bathroom!"

The old hunter stared at him then over toward the restroom as they stood amidst the still vibrating chaos. Bobby shoved Dean out the open front door and into the hotel hallway before rushing off to the bathroom.

Dean stumbled and couldn't keep his feet, leaving bloody prints on the door to 206 as he fell, his legs too wobbly to support him.

The spike of pain was gone, so he could breathe again, but his head continued to pound, the cause of his pain still echoing inside him. Looked like whatever had come to visit was gone again like last time, though it felt like it'd tried to give him a longer, stronger greeting this round. It made no sense whatsoever.

He was just glad Bobby's timing was as impeccable as always. If he was back, it meant Pamela was out of danger. Not that she'd ever be the same thanks to them. One thing at a time though, there were other more pressing concerns at the moment.

His gaze rooted to Bobby as his friend came back. He was alone. Dean found it hard to breathe again. "Where's Sammy?" His voice sounded as if it were coming from a deep well.

Bobby shook his head. "He's not here."

Or at least that's what Dean thought he said. He couldn't be sure. He was too relieved to know his brother hadn't been anywhere near the chaos to worry about the fact he was missing – at least for the moment.

"Let's get you out of here before whatever that was decides for a repeat performance." Bobby lifted Dean off the floor again and immediately started heading for the stairs, half carrying him.

Dean was forced to concentrate on just putting one foot in front of the other, not having the power to do much else.

The two of them made it outside without hindrance. No one in the lobby or outside seemed even aware that anything had gone on -- though they did tend to stare as Dean stumbled by with his bloodied hands and ears. Wait till they got a load of the room upstairs.

He sighed with relief as Bobby opened the door to the Camaro for him and he slipped inside into the passenger seat. Without prompting, Bobby turned the engine over and drove out of the lot. The farther they went, the better Dean felt. His hand barely shook as he took the red handkerchief Bobby offered him a minute later.

Dean stared at his raked knuckles as he wiped the blood off his hands. Not yet two days old and already he was putting his body through the ringer. He reached up to get the blood he could feel pooling in his ear.

"How you doing, kid?"

Dean threw a look in Bobby's direction, not entirely sure how to answer that, but glad his words came through loud and clear. "Aside from church bells ringing in my head, peachy." Looked like he'd gotten lucky and his hearing was intact. Thank goodness for small favors. This also meant he could take care of other pressing business. He fumbled for his cell phone and using the light glaring in through the windshield from the street, he punched in Sam's cell number.


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Sam was staring so intently for any signs of movement across the street inside the closed diner he almost jumped when his cell went off. Staring at in surprise, he glanced at the caller ID and saw it was Dean. A twinge of apprehension shot through him, having anticipated that his brother would sleep for several hours, leaving him plenty of time to take care of things and get back without him ever suspecting he'd been gone. He flipped the phone open hoping nothing was wrong. "Hey."

"What are you doing?" Dean knew the question came out a little gruff, but his brother leaving the room without letting him know he was going or where, especially with everything that had happened lately, hadn't left him in a good mood. If Sammy had deigned to leave him a note, there was no way he'd be finding it in the mess upstairs anyway, so might as well get the 'story' straight from the horse's mouth.

"Couldn't sleep. Went to get a burger." Sam fidgeted inside figuring a half truth was better than none. With Dean's usual protective streak, and what he heard in his brother's tone, he could well imagine he'd not taken finding him gone too well. He'd hoped his brother would never be the wiser for it. When Dean crashed, he normally crashed hard. Could he have been awakened by a nightmare? Though his brother had told him he remembered nothing of his time in Hell, something which Sam hoped with all his heart and soul was true, maybe a part of him still remembered some of it.

"In my car?" Though he'd been a little distracted at the time, Dean didn't recall seeing it in its spot at the parking lot. Another major rule broken and Dean hadn't been back a week yet. Sam knew better than to take Baby out without permission. He really _was_ suicidal.

"Force of habit. Sorry." Sam felt his irritation rise though he tried hard not to let it. Asking permission from anyone over anything was long past in his book the moment Dean died. Getting taken to task for it on top of that was definitely something he didn't need right now. There were more important things afoot.

Though Dean being awake could be an issue. "What are you doing up?"

Sam glanced out the window again toward the dark diner wishing like heck Dean wouldn't get it into his head to go out to raid the very place he was going to as well. The way his luck ran sometimes, he wouldn't have been all that surprised. What Dean said wasn't always what Dean did. And there was no way his brother wasn't worried about three demons on the loose and so very close to where they were staying.

Dean heard the question and it brought back everything that had happened but minutes ago and he felt his ire cool. There were reasons why he should be damn glad Sammy had been out and about instead of at the hotel, and he needed to remember that. Also the longer Sam stayed away from there and seeing the destruction and all the ugly questions that would raise, the better. "Well, uh, Bobby's back. Going to go grab a beer."

He was waiting for it and wasn't disappointed when Bobby threw him a look like what the hell was he talking about, beer being the last thing on their minds. Dean raised a hand, second finger up, silently asking him to hold off from making any comments at the moment. Bobby didn't look thrilled at this, but kept his thoughts to himself regardless.

Dean tensed, waiting to see what Sammy would make of what he'd said, knowing it was lame as hell. The two of them were family, yet lately, even before he'd been dragged to Hell and back, all he and Sam seemed to do was lie and keep things from each other. How did they always end up like this?

Sam blinked, the remark sounding strange, especially at this hour of the morning. Dean had been exhausted and if Bobby just got in, he'd probably not had a chance to rest either. Going out for a beer was the last thing he'd expect either of them to want to do.

He decided not look a gift horse in the mouth though, not if it meant his brother would be busy and out of the way. Surprisingly, Dean didn't even ask for him to join them, so that was another hurdle passed. He couldn't have set it up any better. "All right, well, uh, spill some for me, huh?"

Hopefully, it would stay that way. The lies and secrets were already so deep it was disturbing. He'd not liked doing it last year when Dean's time was running out on the contract, but with his attitude back then, and his insistence not to place Sam in danger by mucking with the deal, Sam had had no choice but to research into the thing on his own, secretly. In the end it had gotten him nowhere, but it had been better than doing nothing. It felt odd having to repeat the same patterns just so his brother wouldn't see the things he could now do to keep him safe.

Dean couldn't believe Sam was falling for this. Even better, he'd not even mentioned wanting to meet up with them. He clamped onto this fast, before his sibling might think to change his mind. This would work out perfectly, with Sammy none the wiser and totally out of danger's radar. "Done. Yeah, I'll catch you later."

He closed the cell phone with a certain amount of relief. Sam would be out of the way and safe while he settled things. Dean had nowhere he could hide and knew that now. Whoever or whatever this Castiel was could find him anytime it wanted. It would be best if they met on Dean's terms and not its. Tonight, too, had shown him just how easily what happened to Pamela could end up being Sam's fate as well. And that would _not_ do. Especially with Sam's new seeming semi suicidal gung ho-ness. For his brother to be jumping willingly into the line of fire was not what Dean had signed up for. He needed to get rid of this Castiel as soon as possible. Bring things back to a manageable level, then get things squared with Sammy again.

Sam hung up the call and stared at the phone, glad he'd be free to take care of business. With Dean not there, he was open to use all the means at his disposal to get rid of the demons. Another set of evil bastards would be struck from the list and he would take yet another step in making himself stronger and hopefully riding the world of Lilith's evil forever. Thus guaranteeing she'd never get her mitts on Dean again.

Though their plates were full, these demons needed taking care of. He wasn't about to let their enemies run free until they got it into their heads to try to take Dean back to her to gain her favor. Whatever they were afraid of, it would only hold them off for so long. So he would take them out before they even contemplated the thought. No way was Dean being taken from him, not when he'd just got him back. Plus the less of their kind that knew Dean was around and where, the less chance Lilith would try to do something about it.

Dean stared out the front windshield of Bobby's car, his course set. He didn't like lying to Sammy and keeping things from him, but what he liked wasn't always what needed to be done. And he had to get rid of this Castiel. Only then would he get the chance to try to vainly tip the scales for all the evil he had done in Hell. Something he hoped _never_ to tell his brother about.

Sam reached for the handle of the driver's door, ready for whatever awaited him inside the diner. Later, once that problem was solved, he could start worrying about how to gently start working on Dean to let him know the truth about what he'd been doing the last four months. His brother would flip. There was no doubt about that. It might even come to blows. But he would find a way. He had to. Yet in the end it would change nothing.

They would do whatever they had to, to keep each other safe. Even if it meant keeping secrets.

The End

In Memory of Kim Manners – without whose vision and great work this episode would not have been all that it was, or drive me to write a novelization of most of it. Mr. Manners, you will be missed…

Notes: For anyone curious, 40 or so minutes of show took 9 plus hours (done in 2 hour increments or less, I am only so insane, you know) to get all the info I needed down and jotting mad flares of epiphanies or ideas as I went along. Had to go back several times too! I kept missing details or being distracted. At one point I had to turn the sound off as the hotel room was driving me batty and it was the only way I could truly pay attention and finally get that super simple floor plan (which had not seemed simple at all before!) down.

I made many discoveries while taking this sucker apart. Things I'd not discovered in my usual 3 time viewing of episodes. Green and Red were total motifs in this episode, used in a myriad of lovely ways visually, yet the shades were soft and varied enough that you wouldn't normally notice though the work on the subconscious would still go on. The only people not part of this scheme were Sam/Ruby, done in gray (though Ruby did succumb to a red shirt when she was leaving) and Pamela, who was in black and gray, though her home had lots of red, the outside green. Watch the episode again with no sound and look at the colors. It will blow you away.

Could have never done this sucker without Kim Manners, Jared and Jensen (and their fabulous work), and all the other wonderful people who put such time and creativity into making this show all that it is. Thank you! You made this so easy for me! Keep up the great work!

And finally thanks to my beta Kaz for poking me with sticks when I needed it and keeping those eyes peeled. Yay! (Though I still didn't measure up to her monster angst meter. Sigh…) Heh heh.

Hope you all enjoyed the ride! Happy Reading!


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